Circle of Nil
by TMC
Summary: A series of stories set in the world of Exalted, set around the adventures of an Eclipse Caste Solar and her Circle, and their allies and enemies.
1. Nil

* * *

The Threshold, south of Chiaroscuro. A small train of horses and a pair of wagons wound its way through the gullies and over hills. The wagons were empty now, but set to return laden with long delayed tribute. They had departed with the blessings of the ruler of Chiaroscuro, flowery, and ultimately meaningless, words. Not one of the visitors from the Blessed Isle wanted to be there. They were impatient to get on. None of the Exalted wanted this delay – only Maret. What else did she have but the largesse of her betters?  
  
Anjis Maret came along as one of a Circle, one she was nominally a part of, but forever barred from, for all intents and purposes. Her stalwart brother, Anjis Pren, the twin sisters passionate Ledaal Niloba and sweet Ledaal Linopa, they were all Exalted, but Maret had never felt the grace of the Dragons upon her, despite her noble bloodline. Maret was a brilliant negotiator – for a mortal. She was a peerless swordswoman – for a mortal. Maret was exquisitely charming – for a mortal. The twins would never say as much – Pren would never so much as think it – but Maret knew people. Even Exalted people. She could feel it.  
  
They found a use for Maret's lamentable mortality. The Dragon-Blooded were imposing people, while Maret was pleasant enough looking and well-spoken enough to put people at ease. It was only a minor mission, anyway – they were to check on Ledaal Larajo's holdings to the south, and prepare for him to make a personal visit at his leisure. So the pretty patrician girl did most of the talking, backed by her imposing Exalted companions. It was the story of her life, really. When all else would fail, they sent for Maret.

------------------------------------------------------------It was too damn hot. That's why there was no real civilization here. Maret was used to the relatively mild seasons of the Blessed Isle. In the Anjis compound near Arjuf, all the year round was more pleasant than this. Here, the sun seemed quite determined to make Maret's fair skin an angry red. A broad hat capped her thick black hair, but in front of her, Pren was bared to the sun. A glance over her shoulder confirmed that Niloba and Linopa were similarly exposed. Mela's Teeth, the twins seemed to thrive on it. It wasn't surprising, Niloba being a Fire Aspect, and Linopa being Wood. Apparently, only the lowly mortals had to deal with sunburn.  
  
"You're looking fairly miserable there, sis," Pren was blunt as usual, yet another reason Maret was allowed to do most of the talking. "I guess this means you won't be visiting Larajo's new place very often?"  
  
It had been two years since Maret had shared a bed with Ledaal Larajo, but that still stung. She reflexively turned her head away from her brother.  
  
"Oh. Damn. I'm sorry, Maret." Pren's blocky face was honestly contrite. "I thought you and he were..."  
  
"We are. Perfectly fine," Maret was quick to assure him. She even made a credible effort at a laugh. "Who knows better about political expediency than me?" Concubine to an up and coming Ledaal lord – that was Maret's claim to fame. She shared Ledaal Larajo's life for three years, practically man and wife while they waited for her to Exalt as her brother had – sometime Exaltation came late, after all. It never happened, of course. So, here she was, checking on his businesses, since his family had arranged a proper marriage for him. Maret was known to have a good head for business. For a mortal.  
  
Three Dragon-Blooded, and a cadre of mortal warriors, guarding a couple empty wagons. It should have been an easy journey, but Maret felt unquiet nonetheless. Behind her, Niloba made sarcastic remarks about the barbarity of Chiaroscuro's nobility and Linopa laughed in that musical way of hers. In front of her, Pren's broad back was relaxed, the gait of his horse slow and even. But something was wrong.  
  
The sun was heading down, the next village was just around the bend, through a narrow gap in the rocky hills that surrounded, and suddenly the horses were rearing and balking at the fiery-maned lions that swarmed about them.  
  
There was confusion, but it was short-lived. The highborn of the Realm, mortal or Exalted, were warriors born and bred. Pren leapt down from his horse, sword already in his hand, and his anima flared, encasing him in light like a glittering diamond. Niloba charged, lance at the ready, and lions scattered, while Linopa rallied the mortal guards with a few sharp gestures and shouts of command.  
  
Swords rang as Exalted and unExalted alike fought the lions. The mortals acted as one under Linopa's command, and they might have broken if not for her steadying presence. As for Pren, he was literally a guiding light, carving a brutal path through the enemy with hammer-like blows of his sword, his fists, his feet. As the lions roared and leapt, Niloba leapt from her horse, her anima limning her whipcord body in flame, and she wielded her jade-tipped lance like a long spear, scattering the attackers like dust before a storm.  
  
Maret alone stood in waiting. She was hardly idle – her straight sword flicked and slashed and stabbed, and no lion went away unscathed, if it went away at all. As mortals went, she was a master of the blade and she could kill the lions with impunity. While she was no expert on the breed, she was fairly certain this was odd behavior for lions. This was but a distraction for something else.  
  
There was a lull, and Maret rode forward to warn Pren, but it was already too late. The road before and the road behind were blocked by tall and slender warriors on lions as big as chargers. Their warlike panoply shone in the waning afternoon sun in a blinding array of colors and their uplifted spears were nothing more than delicate spindles, but Maret had no doubt they would pierce flesh and jade and bone with little effort. The Fair Folk had come.  
  
The first wave of lions was gone as if they'd never been – and likely as not, they never had been there, just illusions to distract while the fey marauders maneuvered into position. In the stillness of that moment, a single faerie lord, wrapped in orange and red gossamer, his skin like obsidian, and hair like fire, rode forth.  
  
"We are the Folk of the Ravening Flame, and we require a tithe." The Fair Folk noble's blazing eyes flicked hungrily over the gathered folk, lingering on the Chosen among them. "Ten mortals or one Exalt. Fight, and you will all be taken anyway. You are outnumbered. Comply and live. Bargain for your lives."  
  
"We will give you nothing-!" Pren started to say, fist raised. His diamond- bright anima roiled and rumbled like a nascent earthquake. He would have said more, but Maret had dismounted and begun to walk forward.  
  
"I will bargain," she told the Lord of the Ravening Flame, and she realized in that moment she was smiling. Something about this moment was making her feel more alive than she had ever felt before. Not training with the great warriors of the Blessed Isle, not her socializing among the demigods of the Realm at the side of her Dragon-Blooded lover – nothing was like this moment. Maret knew the Lord of the Ravening Flame was hers. She could feel it down to her very soul.  
  
"Will you, little girl?" The Lord of the Ravening Flame dismounted to meet her. Maret wasn't tall – she was considered practically petite by Blessed Isle standards. The Fair One towered over her. He was taller even than the Ledaal twins. She had to look upward to meet his eyes, cool blue to mad blazing red.  
  
"Do you offer yourself?" he asked. "Forgive me, but you are not... high value currency."  
  
But for Maret and the Lord of the Ravening Flame, everything was so still and quiet now. Even the waning Sun seemed to have stopped in its track. The eyes of all Creation were on Anjis Maret and the Lord of the Folk of the Ravening Flame, or so it felt to her.  
  
"I offer something infinitely more valuable," Maret told him. Her blood raced, but she was thrilled, unafraid. "I offer sport. I offer a challenge."  
  
Fire flashed in the eyes of the faerie lord. He leaned forward, close enough for Maret to note how unnaturally smooth his skin was.  
  
"A... challenge, little one?"  
  
"I posit to you here that I am the best fighter here," Maret kept her voice quiet, but it rang with the challenge nonetheless. "Including my noble Exalted companions. Including you."  
  
A strangled gasp was torn from Pren. "No!" More softly, gentle Linopa echoed his gasp. But none of them dared come forward. Maret was doing the talking, and she did it best of all of them.  
  
The fiery eyes searched Maret, looking for some duplicity, some trick, but there was none to be found. She had waited all her life for a challenge such as this, a moment to prove her worth in the eyes of her spiritual betters.  
  
"Name your terms," said the Lord of the Ravening Flame.  
  
"We will duel until one of us yields," Maret replied. "Sword to sword. If you yield, we will go free, and you will trouble this region no more. If I yield, I will deliver to you the caravan and more. I will be yours to bring more souls under your sway. Of course, if either of us kills the other, the deal is off."  
  
"Confident, aren't you?' The noble fey flashed sharp teeth. "I accept your terms."  
  
Maret touched her hand to his, and something welled up within her. She felt hot, flushed with bright warmth, and suddenly, she could see it – ghostly white and bright golden light writing runes of binding into the air, swirling around and between the pair, sanctifying the accord before Heaven. Maret knew, without knowing how she knew, that the oath could only be broken now on the oathbreaker's peril. And the Lord of the Ravening Flame knew it, too.  
  
"Your kind have named you well, Deceiver!" The Lord of the Ravening Flame's slim silver sword flashed from its sheath. "You have drawn me into your snare. But can you hold me?"  
  
Maret was dimly aware of Pren's anguished moan behind her. "Oh, no, Maret! Oh, no, no..." and she shoved it from her mind as she lifted her blade. There was no time to dwell on what she had done, or what she might have become. She could feel her forehead burn – she knew the mark of the Anathema would be shining upon it.  
  
The Lord of the Ravening Flame rushed forward like his namesake, the point of his sword seeking Maret's flesh. She felt her Essence guide her away from the blow, but still the attack cut through her shirt. Never had she faced anyone so quick. Maret grinned anyway.  
  
"Struggle, mighty hunting cat, all you like, but you are firmly caught now!"  
  
Snarling like desert lion, the Lord of the Ravening Flame came on. He had supernatural skill and speed, his slender blade spinning in a bright silver blur. Maret's blade met every strike, and though she was quick, her arms and shoulders soon had several nicks and cuts. She didn't feel them at all, only the rhythm of the battle in her blood; she was learning her opponent's weaknesses with each clash of blades.  
  
When frustration broke the faerie's rhythm, Maret struck away his wild swing, her sword trailing golden light, then countered her blade quick and bright as lightning. Her sword cut a hissing, smoking wound into the faerie's extended arm.  
  
"Yield!" Maret held her sword at the ready, point extended, left hand out for balance. Her opponent recoiled, then lunged again. And again Maret's sword lifted in a gold-white arc of sparkling light, turned aside the thrust, and burned an actinic white as it struck back faster than Lord of the Ravening Flame could react. A long, smoking slash appeared on the Fair One's chest.  
  
Maret leveled her sword again. "Do you yield?"  
  
"I yield," hissed the Lord of the Ravening Flame, his bitterness snapping out like a physical blow. Without further word, he turned and mounted his lion, and the Folk left as swiftly and silently as they had arrived. They would not return. They could not, bound by the oath.  
  
Twilight was fast approaching. When Maret turned to face the silent assembly behind her, she realized the white gold flame that surrounded her was the brightest illumination in that narrow defile, the light washing the stone in eerie luminescence. She could see the stunned faces of the mortal retinue, the dawning hatred of Ledaal Niloba, the pained sorrow of Ledaal Linopa, and worst of all, Pren's starkly horrified look, his entire broad form weighted down with an unspeakable sadness. His sister had become Anathema, a demon fit only to be killed, a carrier of spiritual corruption that had nearly destroyed the world so very long ago.  
  
"Die, Anathema!" Niloba took one step and hurled her lance at Maret with all the force of her Exalted might. Fire raced behind it as it burned through the air.  
  
Ten minutes before, Maret would have died. Ten minutes before, Maret was only a mortal. Even as the lance left Niloba's hand, Maret was already in the air, arms akimbo, head over heels, and the lance flew beneath her as she spun forward, to hit the earth in a fiery explosion. She landed in a crouch, arms outspread, only a few feet from Niloba now, close enough to feel the searing heat from the Fire Aspect's raging anima.  
  
"No! Wait...!" cried ever-gentle Lanopi, but if she meant to forestall Maret or Niloba, no one ever knew but Lanopi herself. Pren was moving forward now, but too slowly. There was time enough for one final blow. Quick as the flame she embodied, Niloba was already on the move, her hand beckoning at her lance. And the lance responded, lifting in a twist of hot air to flash back toward her hand...  
  
Maret focused her will, her desperation, into one great leap. Screaming an inarticulate warcry, she pushed herself up from her crouch, up into the air, feet pedaling, arms still outspread. Ignoring the pain from the silent fire that surrounded Niloba, Maret struck the Fire Aspect twice in the forehead, once with each heel, sending her sprawling. Maret caught the lance in her left hand as it passed even as she landed, flipped it over, and held it over the fallen Dragon-Blood point down. Pren drew up short.  
  
Standing above Ledaal Niloba, lance raised, blazing like the corona of an eclipsed sun, Maret looked at her brother, and felt tears spring to her eyes. She had changed, become more than she was before, but not at all as she had dreamed, and she and her brother would be separated even more than they were as mortal and Chosen of the Dragons, now and forever.  
  
"I'm not a monster, Pren," she whispered hoarsely. "Please, you have to believe me!" Maret tossed the lance at his feet and ran into the encroaching night.  
  
Never one to let danger cloud her thoughts, Maret tried to find a place to go to ground and think, clambering up over rocks away from the sight of the narrow road. As the night darkened, the light around her would become more and more visible – the aura that marked her as one of the Anathema.  
  
Anjis Maret was a child of the Realm, a distant scion of the Scarlet Dynasty. By the Dragons, her mother and brother both were Exalted! Certainly she was an indifferent follower of the Immaculate Precepts at best, but so were thousands of other highborn of the Realm. How is it that she was cursed with a demon spirit, and these weren't? Then again, she didn't feel possessed. In fact, she felt more herself than she ever had. She could beat Ledaal Niloba in single combat! She even felt smarter, if such a thing were possible. And in her was no bloodlust, no desire to corrupt or destroy, no hatred of the Dragon-Blooded. Yet, if she was not a demon spirit in a mortal body, what was she?  
  
Maret didn't sleep that night. She kept walking, ducking from rock to rock, and the light around her faded away before darkness had truly fallen. Was her brother looking for her? She knew Niloba would want to find and 'purge' Maret, devout daughter of the Dragons that she was. What Maret do if Pren, Niloba, and Linopa formed their own impromptu Wyld Hunt? Could she fight her own brother? The sisters she thought of as part of her own Circle, even though she wasn't Exalted herself? Unable to still her thoughts, Maret headed steadily away from the road, angling herself back toward Chiaroscuro, where she could lose herself in the crowd, and no one would be the wiser.  
  
Without wagons to slow her down, Maret made good time through the hills, despite the lack of a horse. By late afternoon, the great east-west road along the coast of the Inner Sea was before her, and down the slope, a great caravan passed, a Guild caravan, slowly making its way away from Chiaroscuro. An even better place to disappear. Nimbly, she jumped from rock to rock, not bothering to be stealthy. No need to make the guards overly nervous by looking like a bandit, after all.  
  
Someone broke from the flow of wagons and horses and marching men to meet her, his horse moving at a quick canter. As soon as the distant figure started to move, Maret knew it was Pren.  
  
She should have run, but it wasn't in her to do so. No, last night, Anjis Maret only fled to avoid harming her brother and her friends. Now, she would stand fast, come what may.  
  
Pren's horse was close enough to reach out and touch, before he stopped.  
  
"Niloba's gone ahead with Linopa," Pren told her, without preamble. "I swore to her I'd try to get you to turn yourself in. If you don't, the Hunt's coming after you."  
  
"Turn myself in?" Maret laughed, in spite of the moment, though without any shred of humor. "You know as well as I do about the Anathema brought to the Imperial City. They likely went the way of Her Scarlet Majesty herself." Vanished without a trace, in other words. The official screed was that the Scarlet Empress had retired into solitary contemplation for the betterment of the Realm, but Maret had heard rumors that whatever had unnaturally extended the Empress's long life had finally called its debt due.  
  
"Mela's breath, Maret, what do you expect?" Pren, never quick to embrace change, was struggling. She could see it, and felt no anger, only sorrow. She was coming to the realization that she was not cursed, but Exalted beyond the dreams of any Dragon-Blooded.  
  
"I expect to be left alone, if we are still friends, if you are still my brother, since I can never go back." Maret put her hand on his. "I'm not a monster. No demon has taken me... but I can't be Anjis Maret anymore, either. Just tell Niloba you couldn't find me."  
  
Pren shifted uncomfortably in his saddle, but his hand turned to grasp his sister's. "I swore. You know I can't do that. She's going to come after you personally. Niloba said she can't bear to see a demon in the skin of her friend. And you know wherever Niloba goes, Linopa follows. They're going to try to kill you, Maret. And... you're bigger than they are now. If it's true,, and you're not a monster, remember they they aren't either, when you come." More quietly, and more hesitantly, he continued. "Don't stay around Chiaroscuro. They'll start the search here, you know."  
  
"I figured as much. Thank you, Pren." Maret didn't want to let go of his hand. It would be like cutting the last tie between them, the last tie to the world of Anjis Meret, of House Anjis, of the days of opulence in the Realm. But she did let go, and let him go.  
  
"I'll take the long way back," Pren told her, his horse already backing away. "Be good," he said, as he had said to her so many times before.  
  
She had to smile. "Now, you know I just can't make that promise." It had always been a joke between them. This time, it was goodbye. Pren left at a gallop, west, toward the city.  
  
When he was no longer visible, she continued down to the caravan and fell in alongside a group of marching mercenaries. The one in the lead glared at her from under his helmet, likely mistaking her for some lost, pampered girl from the Blessed Isle, which, as a matter of fact, she was.  
  
"If you want to buy a slave, you'll have to wait until the marketplace." The mercenary took a look at her bloodstained shirt. "Clothes... just walk up the train. You'll find something."  
  
"I'll keep that in mind," she told her companion of the moment, "but for now could you just show me who I talk to if I want to hire on?"  
  
The mercenary checked his pace, looking more directly at the slight girl beside him, likely taking in her fair, untanned skin, and once-rich clothing. Finally, he shrugged sympathetically.  
  
"You'll want to talk to Beneficent Ivory, and if she likes you, she might put in a good word for you with Seyd." His helmeted head jerked toward the front. "He's behind the yeddim train. Can't miss his wagon."  
  
She picked up her pace, but before she got too far ahead, the mercenary called her, his voice curious. "Hey! Who are you, anyway?" Maybe he saw something familiar in her. Or maybe he saw something in her that was worth knowing, worth remembering for later.  
  
There was a pause, then she tossed a smile she hoped was flippant over her shoulder.  
  
"I'm nobody important. Nothing. Nil."  
  
"Nil." The mercenary grunted, not understanding, and she walked on.  
  
"Nil," she echoed. It was as good a name as any. She took it with her to Beneficent Ivory, then on to Sayd. It was only the first new name of many. 


	2. Honey Tongued Devil

Talt, one of the Varang City-States. From great towers, the bells rang every hour, on the hour. Every hour, every minute was tracked with exquisite precision in Varang, for here the Sun, Luna, and the stars set the courses of life for the people below.  
  
Astrologers ran a brisk business, drawing up horoscopes for both the highborn and the low. Guides also did fairly well in Varang cities. Through some obscure astrological law, the streets were rigidly arranged to form perfect triangles, something alien to most veteran city-dwellers from other places. Furthermore, the Varangans seemed to have some objection to signs. Instead, every building was painted or trimmed in a bewildering array of colors that were certainly meaningful to natives, but only confusing to the visitor.  
  
Traveling through Varang was almost more trouble than it was worth, but there was money to be made, if one was willing to put up with the idiosyncrasies. Among the Varangans, there was a place for everyone, and everyone was well-advised to stay in that place – for so decreed the heavens. Outsiders were a mystery, a random element, possibly high born, possibly low, likely even good fortune. Just in case, they were given deference.  
  
One of these outsiders was a rather smallish woman. Her black hair and fair skin, her bold nose and full mouth proclaimed her to be from the Blessed Isle, perhaps even of high birth, for she did not have the weathered look of a peasant or slave and her manner of dress was both rich and flamboyant. With her was a small cluster of porters and bodyguards, but she carried a slender sword at her side with a confidence born of supreme skill. Once she was Anjis Maret, a scion of the Realm, if a minor one. But now, she called herself simply Nil.  
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There were better places to be than the teeming streets of Talt. It was an ally of the Realm from which the Dragon-Blooded ruled. There was even a garrison of Dynasts here. While they were unlikely to recognize Nil as a fugitive from the Realm, she nonetheless kept her broad hat pulled low.  
  
She had no choice, of course. She was leader of her own impromptu caravan, such as it was. They weren't three days on the road from Chiaroscuro before the Guild caravan she had started with began referring to her as the Honey- Tongued Devil, due to her uncanny skill in making money off even the most improbable transactions. It was so easy for her that she caught the eye of Seyd, the caravan's master, who sponsored her own entry into the Guild. Nil had always been good at business, but since the day she had become Anathema, she was her own good luck charm. She had but to think of where and how to sell a thing, and she'd know how to make the best profit. She could know the intrinsic value of a thing with just the proper glance.  
  
At first just a mercenary, Nil's talents as a merchant quickly came to the fore when she would make deals with the Guild's merchants. By the time Varang was reached, Nil had amassed enough money to pay off her debt to Seyd, and then some, then struck out on her own as a full-fledged member of the Guild. With her new talents, she could navigate the bizarre Varangan culture with more ease than those who had been traveling there for years. She never mixed up a high-caste maker of vestments for a middle-cast seamstress. It was easy for her to pick up the proper signs and customs and phrases, and whenever Nil spoke, there was never any cause for offense. And then in Kriss, she had heard of a wondrous thing – a cask of black wood and the magical metal orichalcum. From the moment she heard of it, Nil could see that cask in her mind's eye – in her dreams – and she knew she had to possess it. It was in Talt, and so Talt was where she went, amassing a small fortune to buy that treasure for herself.  
  
A train of bearers and scribes and guards at her back, Nil found a guide to take her to the merchants district, a cluster of squat, multicolored office buildings. Trailing her small army, Nil passed within.  
  
The outside was unimpressive, but the inside was richly appointed – rich carpets from the East, and bright gold and gems from the South, and everywhere intricate timepieces, a hallmark of Varangan society. Beyond the antechamber, in a spacious private office, as their contact in Talt, dressed in his precisely ordered finery. It all had some meaning, much of which was lost on Nil, but she could feel the greater flow of society here, if she tried. She knew the right words to say, and more importantly, what not to say. She was unprepared, however, for the pained sorrow that greeted her arrival.  
  
"As I have been told, I have suffered a great loss," the merchant she had come to meet told her. "There have been... bad omens." He was already doing somewhat of a favor for Nil by selling such a dangerous item to a stranger. The Dragon-Blooded looked poorly upon those that sold items connected to the First Age or the Anathema to anyone but them.  
  
"I am sorry to hear that," Nil told him carefully. "Have the stars foretold some calamity of which I am a part?" Hands folded before her, she was all polite concern. "Would you let me hear what is to come, so perhaps we might work it out together? Sometimes the messages we hear have more meaning that which is immediately apparent."  
  
"I suppose so." The merchant settled down again, behind the desk, and motioned for Nil to sit before him. "I am afraid your cask is already gone, however."  
  
"How?" Nil sat up straight, incensed. "How could you do that? I sent ahead a messenger –"  
  
"Who never arrived," the merchant said, hands twisting nervously.  
  
"Then you've sold my item to an imposter." But her anger was already fading, thinking over what had happened. Someone very quick and very smart had planned this out, nearly to the hour. The idea of such a theft was both disturbing and thrilling all at once. Nil loved a challenge.  
  
"I know," he said, hands now nervously rummaging through papers on his desk. "Another came, not an hour ago, with a small sack of priceless stones. He took the cask I was to deliver, claiming to be your agent. He knew every detail." The merchant's tone turned more than a little bitter. "And when he left, my money was gone. Who was I to report this to? The Guild? The Realm? I am never dealing in such things again."  
  
"Why don't you tell me your horoscope, and we'll proceed from there," Nil said. It was equivalent to asking a proud parent about his or her child, in Varang territory. Everyone worth anything consulted astrologers here. Besides... the horoscope might actually turn out to help.  
  
"I was told night would take away my fortunes, but not to fear, for an eclipse would bring it back to me. The light of the sun would be clouded, but it would take two suns' departure to bring me a blessing of double measure." The merchant hung his head. "I have interpreted matters too literally. I thought I was safe until nightfall – now must I wait for an eclipse for my fortunes to turn again?"  
  
Something like a half-buried memory tugged at Nil when she heard the merchant's words. Since she had become Anathema, such feelings had come more often and more strongly. Sometimes, she would wake up from half- remembered dreams of a place of wonders she had never seen with waking eyes, where she was revered instead of reviled for her unique talents. The word 'eclipse' evoked the image of the mark that sometimes shown from her forehead, a golden disk within a golden circle. To her tutors on the Blessed Isle it was the mark of the Anathema known as the Deceivers, identifying Nil as a demon in the shape of a mortal being, a hellish liar. In some ways, the moniker of Honey-Tongued Devil was more right than the carvaneers would probably ever know.  
  
"Noble merchant," Nil said, after a moment of thoughtful silence, "I believe I might be able to assist, if you will allow. You may place your trust in me, for I was born under an eclipse." Not quite the truth, but unless the merchant was an astrologer, he would not know it. Eclipses, after all, did not show over the whole of Creation at once. At least Nil was taught so. "My retinue shall remain here, with your payment. This thief shall learn the depths of his folly. Either way, you get the payment I brought you, in my sincerest apologies." After all, she could always make more.  
  
Alone, she went into the city, leaving behind her guards and her treasure, hoping beyond hope to find this thief quickly. Though she'd never been here before, she knew where she was going. There weren't many criminals in the Varang cities, because everyone was guaranteed a place in life and a more or less productive occupation – all except those outcasts who had the misfortune of being born in such a way that the minute and hour of their births could not be recorded. These people made a living doing jobs that were too menial or demeaning even for the lowest of castes. And those that did not wish to demean themselves turned to crime. Nil had a guide point her in the direction of the outcast quarters of town.  
  
Talt was a big city. Angle after angle, a mind-boggling swirl of colors, the quiet murmur of the crowd attending to its meticulously plotted business... Nil found the whole thing a touch disturbing. She couldn't wait to get out of Varang territory. Slowly, but surely, the tenor of the city shifted. Now the angular streets were choked with debris. The buildings were grimy and decaying, their colors faded. Here, everyone wore only black or gray, the colors of the outcast. There was little speech here at all, and every eye turned suspiciously to the brightly-garbed woman that walked in their midst.  
  
There might have been a time when Nil would have been wary of such a place. Her rich clothing made her an obvious target, despite the straight sword at her hip. But now, she was the match of a dozen men. Still, it wouldn't do much good to draw attention to herself. She made quiet inquiries to likely prospects and spread a bit of gold around, to see who might be in the market for First Age artifacts. No one was foolish enough to buy something that would attract so much attention. It was two hours later (by the bells) when Nil realized the thief wasn't going to sell what he'd taken. He was leaving the city. She cursed herself for a fool and hoped she wasn't too late – it was time to retrace her steps with a different tack in mind.  
  
"They're going to attract the wrong kind of attention, no matter how good at hiding they are," said a young pickpocket Nil managed to accost again. Either he didn't know any of the gang's hiding places or wasn't talking. Nil didn't have it in her to badger a boy, so she let him go, but only after getting the name of the gang's preferred forger.  
  
The forger turned out to be more useful than the pickpocket. "Must be a big gang, very good at hiding. They haven't been using my skills for very long, but every time they come down here, it's someone new, with the same reference. Call themselves the Fortunates." Nil paid him just as if he'd done a job for her. It was always good to leave with a favorable impression.  
  
"They're smart, they are," commented a whore who had more than a passing acquaintance with a certain member of the Fortunates. "Ain't been around long, but they've got plenty of money to spread around. They never stay in the same place for long. They got a few safehouses around, just in case. I always thought they was preparing for a big job. Looks like I was right." She was pretty enough for an outcast prostitute, much more willing to sell information than her body, if at a much higher cost. Nil didn't even negotiate price – the people here all needed money in a bad way.  
  
"I don't know his name," the whore said, in a sudden moment of concerned contrition, "but he treats me well. You ain't gonna hurt him, are you?" Nil promised she wouldn't, except in absolute self-defense. That got her a description of the customer, a wiry, spiky black haired, sharp featured man, nd the location of one safehouse.  
  
Squatters were occupying the first house, at least for today, their meager possessions spread out under a roof that looked likely to let more elements than it kept out. They remembered Nil's quarry, though, by the description, and described a friend that came around often, another man, this one stocky and bald, their memories jarred by Nil's silver. Armed with two descriptions, Nil found her way to a fence, a dealer in stolen goods, one that she'd seen earlier that day. Now, she had the proper questions to ask.  
  
"Ah, the Fortunates. Pickpocket, but their talents are wasted," he told Nil. The descriptions brought up the name of the gang without her even having to ask. "Doesn't surprise me much they did something that big. They got a pretty large group, it seems, but they're good at hiding, for all that. Came together under Golden Fortune, who always brought me some premium stuff, but he's not been in for a while, always sending some of his Fortunate people instead."  
  
The name Golden Fortune, and the constant bribery, got Nil to a second safehouse, in another ramshackle building. A quick search found a trapdoor leading to a basement, and in that basement were two men and a woman trying to frantically uncover a hatch leading below into the sewers. These were the two men she'd been told about.  
  
"Wait! Please!" Nil quickly unbuckled her sword, and laid it carefully on the ground before her. They all paused, and she took her opportunity to speak. "My name is Nil, and I'm not with the Realm. But I need to find Golden Fortune. He's got something and he doesn't know how important it is. I know how to deal with such things, how to render it impotent. And most importantly, how to keep it out of the hands of the Realm." She was exaggerating a bit, yes, but it was worth it. She had to have that cask.  
  
The bald stocky man glanced at the woman, a fire-haired, dusky-skinned Southerner. Nil could almost see the thoughts flickering between them. The man in the back, wiry with spiky black hair, halted in the midst of unlatching the hatch. He wanted to run, but didn't want to leave his friends behind – they were about the only friends he had. The stocky man was wavering, doubts that had beset him for a long time, coming to the fore, coaxed out by Nil's words. The red-haired woman knew the man next to her was unsure, and was all the more stubborn for it. She was a lost cause, for fear made her all the more defiant, and Nil would have to concentrate on the men. She could read them all so easily; she could see the Essence between them all flow and twist with their emotions, the bonds between them visible to her eyes.  
  
"I'm here alone," Nil said, hands up. "I just need my cask back. It's only going to get you in trouble. You knew that all along, when Golden Fortune first brought it in, even when he first proposed your plan, didn't you? Did he even tell you it might be from the Anathema? I'll bet he didn't." It was a guess, but Nil knew it was true, when the stocky man's eyes started shifting again. "I'm just a treasure hunter, and we can sweep this all under the rug if it ends soon, but if word gets out that you've got an item connected to the Anathema, it's going to attract the wrong kind of attention. Please, I won't hurt him. I just want to know where he is so I can retrieve my things. Maybe we can make a more equitable deal. A less dangerous one."  
  
"You can't pay us as much as Fortune would have brought back!" the red- haired woman blurted. "We're going to leave this damn city and make something of ourselves! You don't know what it's like living here."  
  
"I can get you that and more." Nil's eyes remained on the stocky man, holding his gaze. He was the weak link in the chain, after all. "I won't say a word about you to anyone, and I'll do what I can not to hurt Golden Fortune, either. I need that cask, though. It's very important to me. He doesn't know what it is, like I do." Another exaggeration, but just as important as the first. To add weight to it, she took off her money pouch, laid it on the floor, then kicked it lightly over with her foot. "If you lay low, that's enough to avoid stealing for a little while. Hopefully long enough for me or Golden Fortune to come back and get you out of here."  
  
The woman glared, more suspicious than ever, but her companion with the bald head picked up the money. "There's a house, not too far from here, and it also leads to the sewers, but this one has a way out of the city, too. It's guarded, but Fortune says he can get by, and I don't doubt it. He's... changed. Something's happened to him." A sharp elbow from the redhead made him fall silent, but the wiry man in the back spoke up now.  
  
"He's always been obsessed with leaving the city. I think he's made a deal with something, like a sorcerer or a demon. He might even be Anathema himself. He can change shape. He can look like any kind of person, man, woman, Easterner, Southerner... I saw him open a lock just by touching it. Fortune's a good man, but... I'm afraid for him. Even the best man can be tempted." And with that, she got the directions to the last safehouse.  
  
It was dilapidated, like so many other buildings of the outcasts, a saggy- timbered residence. It was empty, but the dust was disturbed. In the basement corner was a sleeping pallet hastily departed. It didn't take much work to find the hatch into the sewer and she quickly took it, sure she was close on the heels of Golden Fortune, at long last.  
  
It was the slightest of sounds, the faintest splash of the muck that saved her. Nil turned, her sword flashing out of its sheath, and knocked away the knife that that spun toward her. It splashed harmlessly into the water, and there was a faint curse, and the sound of flashing feet running away. Nil gave chase, and stumbled to a stunned stop as the knife flew up out of the river of filth to return to its owner, somewhere ahead in the gloom.  
  
Light shone from above as the thief opened a hatch and exited into the street. Nil didn't bother to use a ladder. There wasn't time. She bounded from the wall, caught the lip of the hole and lifted herself up with her left hand, still gripping her sword in her right. She immediately threw herself to the ground and another knife went spinning by overhead. Rolling to her feet, she found herself in a narrow alley, lined with debris, which Golden Fortune was using to climb to the rooftop.  
  
Nil gathered herself, jumped against one wall, pushed with her feet, and jumped from the opposite wall, then back, then back again, ascending to the low roof just in time to aim a kick at her quarry's face. Unfortunately for her, he was no longer there. Holding on with one hand to the edge of the roof, he rolled to the side, gripped with his other hand, back to the wall, then repeated the maneuver to pull himself over the wall with both hands. Even as the thief topped the wall, his knife flashed back into his hand.  
  
"What are you?" Nil demanded. She had to know. The anticipation was almost painful.  
  
And the thief's forehead blazed with golden light, a sun-bright circle flaring against his dusky skin.  
  
"I am Anathema! Flee, if you value your soul!" Golden Fortune drew himself up, rather convincingly. But Nil, of course, knew something he didn't. She let her own mark, the golden disk within the circle of gold shine forth from her own forehead.  
  
"Me, too," she told him, and sheathed her sword. "So why don't we sit down and discuss this like intelligent demon spawn?"  
  
Golden Fortune sat, likely more due to his legs giving out from under him from shock than out of any desire to obey her request.  
  
Nil sat down across from him. "That cask is mine. So, why don't we strike a deal that both of us can agree with, before you have the Realm after you?"  
  
"There isn't any deal you can strike that I'll want to hear," said Golden Fortune, more than a little sullenly. He was young, perhaps seventeen, several years younger than Nil herself. His curly black hair, wide dark eyes, and the almost delicate curves of his face would keep him boyishly handsome for years after boyhood was long past.  
  
"Oh, I don't know," Nil said, projecting unconcern. "Tell me what you want."  
  
"I want my sister back, Guild scum." Fortune's entire body was tensed, ready to get up and fight again, if need be.  
  
Nil wasn't quite expecting that. "I... don't even know your sister."  
  
"Of course you don't. None of you ever know, or care. You buy and sell people like animals. Less than animals. At least animals are never sold to the Fair Folk to have their souls devoured."  
  
She knew better than to argue. It was time for him to talk, and for her to listen. "Why don't you tell me exactly what happened, and I'll see if it helps me help you."  
  
The doubt was plain in Fortune's eyes, but he spoke anyway, after a long moment of staring at Nil. Or more directly, at the symbol on her forehead. "Our mother sold her, and left town. It's been two years now. She's probably already use all the money on drugs and ended up face down in a gutter somewhere. And good riddance." He laughed, a rough sound completely devoid of humor". "What better way to get back at you Guild scum than to steal from you, so I could find my sister? Bit by bit, I took those gems from merchants on their way out of town. They never even know I've robbed them until they're long gone." He grinned, savagely. "Like your messenger."  
  
"I'm not a slaver," Nil told him, trying to be placating without sounding placating. "Frankly, all my mercantile efforts for the past few months has been to gather enough money to buy that cask. I have to know more about what I am. We are." Wryly, she added, "I get the feeling the whole Anathema story isn't the entire truth."  
  
"So, I give you the cask and the gems I stole. And then, what? You let me go? Empty-handed?" Fortune started to rise again.  
  
Nil held up a placating hand. "No, no. I'm so glad to find another one of us – whatever we are. I really want to try to find something accommodating for both of us. Look, when I leave the city, I'll take you with me. You wanted to get out of here, anyway, right? I have money, and you were just going to sell the cask anyway, right?"  
  
"We'll find my sister?"  
  
"We'll find your sister."  
  
Again, Fortune looked doubtful, but then a smile touched his lips. "Swear it," he said, holding out his hand.  
  
Nil's mind raced. He knew what she could do! Somehow, he knew exactly what she was. She jumped to her feet, and Fortune jumped to his, and they stood for a moment, staring at each other. Then, Fortune held out his hand again. "Swear it."  
  
"Not until you tell me what you know about me," Nil whispered. She knew she was something other than Anathema, a demon clothed in some mortal's skin, but the truth was elusive. Every night, she dreamed about it, fits and flashes of a world of wonders, of walking among the courts of spirits and binding demons and Fair Folk into enduring pacts. In these dreams, she was not Anathema, but the highest of Exalted, as far above the Dragon-Blooded as the Dragon-Blooded were above common mortals.  
  
"You don't have the dreams?" Fortune lowered his hand again, for now. He had the advantage now. "We're not demons. That's just what the Dragon- Blooded call us to have popular support in killing us. We used to be the true Princes of the Earth, Exalted of the greatest of the gods, the Unconquered Sun."  
  
Nil had never heard any of this before, but even as Fortune spoke the words, she knew them to be true.  
  
"You're an Eclipse," Fortune continued. "A diplomat, a maker of deals and writer of treaties. I'm a Night. I'm supposed to do the things the rest of you are too uncomfortable and unsubtle to to do." There are supposed to be three other Castes, too, but I've never met any of them."  
  
"So... since the Wyld Hunt is rarely called anymore, we're cropping up all over the place, "Nil mused. She had heard the rumors, after all, just like anyone else. The more she thought about it, the more the idea appealed to her. A new Circle, one in which she was an equal. She had been a companion to her Exalted brother and the twin sisters Ledaal Linopa and Ledaal Niloba, but when they had shown to be Chosen of the Dragons, and she herself had not, she was on the outside of their fellowship. Her own subsequent Exaltation, not to the Dragons, but to the Unconquered Sun, had widened that gap. Ledaal Niloba was likely doing her best to hunt down the Anathema that had consumed dear little Anjis Maret, the woman Nil once was.  
  
"Something like that," Fortune said, with a shrug. Apparently, this was not so important to him. But to Nil, a whole new world had just opened up. She could form a new brotherhood, and from there, make her own mark on the world.  
  
Nil held out her hand and Fortune took it. "Give me the cask, and the gems you stole, and I shall do what I can to help you find out the fate of your sister." Runes of binding swirled around them, scribed in the air in white fire, and she was sealed to keep her word. The oath may have been necessary for Golden Fortune, but not for Nil. She had finally found one of her own, and was not prepared to let him go so easily. Now, he was as bound to her as she was to him.  
  
And when the merchant had been paid his money and the gems, as compensation, Nil had an extra member in her retinue, and the small cask in her hands. It felt light, though it was made from black wood and filigreed with oricalchum, and sealed shut, with no way to open it. But it had come to her. It was destined to come to her. If only she could open it.  
  
"There's another one," Golden Fortune told Nil once the city of Talt was behind them.  
  
"Another what?" Nil was absorbed in watching the world roll by through the window of the wagon.  
  
"Another Solar. I was going to find him to open the cask, or at least tell me what it was, so I could get a better value of its worth."  
  
Nil already knew what it was worth. Certainly far more than she had paid, or ever could pay, the merchant of Talt. "Then, I suppose that's where we're going next. I don't suppose you're willing to tell me any details?"  
  
"I don't know any. Just that there's some Anathema from the East, a sorcerer who specializes in old things like that cask," Fortune said. "I was hoping he'd trade it for something less hot."  
  
"I think we both might just get more than we ever dreamed of getting, Golden Fortune," Nil mused. He might have still be suspicious, but to her, it felt so right.  
  
The tiny collection of horses and wagon moved steadily northward, away from Talt, closer to whatever fate held for the two Exalted within. 


	3. Scion of the Unconquered Sun

The Southeast. The Desert of Plague's Triumph. It was said that this was once a land of plenty in the First Age. Verdant fields fed several cities, so the legends said. Now its very name was lost. The Great Contagion swept through like a wildfire, and the Fair Folk came to destroy that which remained. And even the immortal faerie passed, and now there was only death, a shadowland where the realm of death spilled out, a gangrenous wound in the skin of Creation.  
  
Into the shadowland came two children of the Unconquered Sun and the restless dead that made this dark place their home did not hinder them. One was a handsome young Southerner, barely more than a boy. His dark eyes were wild with suppressed fear, his dusky skin ashen, his thick black curly hair nearly on end. The other was a small woman in rich silks, a slim sword at her waist. Her lack of height aside, she was the perfect image of a citizen of the Blessed Isle, the center of the world. Black hair, fair skin, brown tilted eyes, strong nose, and full lips all combined in her rounded face to give her a certain sweet attractiveness. The young man's name was Golden Fortune, and once upon a time, the woman's name was Anjis Maret. But now, she called herself only Nil.  
-------------------------------------  
It was all Fortune's idea, in a roundabout way, but now he clearly regretted the suggestion. Nil didn't need any of her newfound power to tell that he was terrified. The very instant they passed into the shadowland, the silence of death enveloped them like a smothering shroud. Never one to quail at danger, Nil even surprised herself at how unafraid she felt. She knew she was well-protected.  
  
They came alone, no porters, no scribes or servants or bodyguards. Nil had pared her mercantile goods down to a bare minimum, to whatever she and Golden Fortune could easily carry. She, of course, carried in her pack, the cask of black wood and orichalcum that had brought them in the first place.  
  
A month or two of aimless wandering had not brought them any closer to either Fortune's lost sister or to the Exalted sorcerer he had heard was in the area that might know the nature of the cask neither of them could open. Instead, there were many rumors of a dead city in a dead desert where the ghosts of the First Age dwelt, whispering their secrets to a priestess of dark powers. While Nil was never one to shy from danger, she considered the rumor a dead end. She had no desire to offer herself up as a sacrifice to some dark cult.  
  
"The pacts," Golden Fortune had said suddenly, when they were off in the little wagon Nil had procured once more.  
  
She waited to hear more, then. While they both had dreams and flashbacks of who and what they were as Chosen of the Unconquered Sun, Fortune's visions were clearer, stronger, and more frequent.  
  
"The pacts," he said again, his voice distant and trancelike. "The Solar Exalted bound the lands together with pacts. An Eclipse Caste, like you, could travel demon realms and shadowlands and Fair Folk holdings in peace, so long as you followed the rules of hospitality."  
  
As always when Golden Fortune spoke words about his true nature or hers, Nil knew the words to be true, even as he spoke them. So, really, it was Fortune's fault they now traveled the dead black earth of the Desert of Plague's Triumph on foot and minimally armed. More than likely, Fortune wouldn't see it quite that way.  
  
The dead trees had decayed and fallen centuries ago, and so the approaching riders were easy to see, five of them coming fast enough to raise a cloud of dust in their wake. Nil and Fortune continued to walk onward to meet them.  
  
They were all dead, horses and riders alike. Bone gleamed through the desiccated, patchy coats of the gaunt steeds. The riders were rust-spotted, decaying armor over their tattered and withered flesh, and despite their cadaverous appearances, their sunken eyes burned with malign intelligence. In perfect cadences, they drew near to the living pair and formed a tight circle, forcing Nil and Fortune to a stop.  
  
"Chosen of the Unconquered Sun," rasped the rider directly before them, in the name of our dread mistress we welcome you to the Desert of Plague's Triumph. Her Holiness awaits."  
  
"Thank you for your gracious invitation," Nil replied, with a bow. Fortune nervously copied the gesture, and the dead bowed from their saddles. There were no more words as the riders broke their circle to turn back slowly, leading their guests into the heart of the shadowland.  
  
The dead town that was their destination was faded and broken, its buildings jutting out of the ground like rotten teeth, and its pale denizens, living, dead, and undead, like parasites in the maw of the dead land's corpse. Looming over all was the temple, a black fortress, a cathedral dedicated to the worship of the end of all things.  
  
Nil, Fortune, and their dread escort were paid no attention as the people went mechanically about their work. No children played in the streets, and the dead and living alike mingled with no fear. Indeed, it seemed as though the living deferred to the dead in all things, as though the ghosts made manifest by the shadowland were a higher order of being. Even Nil started to feel disturbed. Night was coming on, which meant they would have to stay until dawn. Leaving a shadowland at night was a dangerous and foolish thing to do.  
  
The great wall of the fortress was before them, and they passed through a narrow gate into a courtyard paved in black stone. There the five dead guards dismounted and wan living attendants robed in black came to take those fearsome horses away.  
  
Now that she was close, Nil had to admit there was something grandiose about this ornate, towering edifice of black stone. It seemed a living thing in and of itself, filled with a sort of malevolent, unholy, hungry vitality. She could feel Fortune trembling next to her, likely experiencing the same emotions, but less able to hide them.  
  
A solitary finger came forth from the temple, also cloaked in black. One wave from its pale hand sent the undead guards away, shuffling, the that same hand motioned for Nil and Fortune to follow. The Solars exchanged glances between themselves, resigned. This is what they had come for, after all.  
  
They followed down a long hall through smothering silence and oppressive gloom relieved only by the rare ensconced candle. At last, they passed through a pair of vast double doors into a vast chamber as chill as the grave.  
  
It was quite obviously a chamber of worship, draped in the black of night and the red of blood, and the white of corpses. Mats for kneeling worshippers covered the floor but for aisles through the middle and along the walls, and in the front was an altar before a dais backed by heavy curtains.  
  
Before the altar stood another black robed figure, veiled and dressed as if for burial, every inch of skin covered in layer after layer of shrouds. Nil and Golden Fortune stepped forward to meet the dark figure, and their guide stepped back, disappearing into the encompassing gloom.  
  
The figure moved forward, her swaying walk marking her clearly as a woman. Slender, chalk-white hands lifted to pull back the veil, and Fortune gasped aloud. The woman was beautiful – perilously so – a deathly face given the appearance of cold life. Her pale skin relieved by full red lips and impossibly dark eyes, and her face was perfectly sculpted. Even Nil, raised among the demigods of the Blessed Isle, found herself staring.  
  
"I greet you," said the pale woman in formal tones, "in the name of my great mistress, the Bitter Maiden of the Devouring Sorrow." Fervor shone in these deep, dark eyes, and Nil felt her skin crawl. "I am the Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge, and you are most welcome here."  
  
Nil bowed slightly before the priestess. This was the one that had come seeking. Fortune, taking his ever cue from Nil, bowed as well, never once looking away from the coldly alluring face of the Singer.  
  
"I am Nil, and this is Golden Fortune. We have come seeking your aid."  
  
The Singer smiled, and in that moment, she seemed much less cold and distant, her entire demeanor touched by all too human warmth. Nil was no longer sure what quite to think anymore.  
  
"I know this. We have some hours before services – would you care to sit with me?" She gestured to the curtains on the dais behind the altar.  
  
"You are most kind," Nil responded, and they followed past the curtain into a small, sumptuous chamber lined with couches and cushions. Someone had set out refreshments – fruit, wine, some vegetables, on a table in the center. Such things could not have possibly grown in the shadowland, nor would most merchants come within. Nil wondered where such things might have come from, then considered it was perhaps best not to think on it.  
  
"Did you know," the Singer spoke after long minutes of silence, "that the Desert of Plague's Triumph was once a paradise? An oasis of plenty? Now, it is a testament to the inevitability that I worship, the relentless push of eternal peace." Matched with that warm smile, her words were all the more chilling.  
  
"I knew it," Nil replied simply.  
  
"They sought to preserve their lives and only ended up drawing their entire land into the domain of my mistress – and then into my hand. Death comes at last to all things. Even to you, Scion of the Unconquered Sun."  
  
"Be that as it may, I would like to postpone that for as long as possible." Nil forced herself to sound pleasant. It was just a conversation. Just a friendly chat. She didn't have to look at Golden Fortune to feel the depths of his terror.  
  
"Will you come to services tonight?" the Singer was equally casual.  
  
"I think the Unconquered Sun might frown upon my attendance, but thank you, nonetheless."  
  
The Singer merely smiled again, and held out a perfect, slender hand. An artist's hand, Nil thought. "Lay your prize upon the table."  
  
Nil could feel the slight bulk of the cask clearly against her back, though it was wrapped tightly in her pack. Now it came to it. The negotiations could begin, and as supremely confident as she usually was, Nil wasn't at all certain at how this would turn out.  
  
"We did not come to ask about the artifact, but about the Solar sorcerer who could tell us about it," Nil returned.  
  
That smile softened the Singer's face again. "But you understand there will be a price, correct?"  
  
"I understand this," Nil said carefully.  
  
"I know this sorcerer. I know his name and where he lives." The dark priestess shifted lazily on her couch. "Two items require a double price."  
  
"What would you have of me, then?"  
  
"First, a name for the name," the Singer murmured. "I would have yours, Nil."  
  
"You just spoke it," Nil replied, eyes steady on the woman across from her. She had not even told Golden Fortune her real name or her origins, though he likely suspected she was a wealthy former citizen of the Realm proper, if not actually the patrician she used to be.  
  
"No, no." The Singer shook her head and smiled indulgently, in the manner of a mother pleased by the cleverness of her child. "You are a Dynast, or would have been, but for the circumstances of your birth. A patrician of good standing, I think. Good breeding. It's in your bearing, your accent. I can see it. House... Ragara? No... not Tepet, either. Ledaal, perhaps?"  
  
Nil got the vaguely panicky feeling of being in over her head, though she didn't dare show it. The Singer, through skill or luck, was closer than she knew. Nil's former house was closely allied to Ledaal.  
  
"Anjis," Nil said, her voice steady. "Anjis Maret. House Anjis is allied with Ledaal, since we are... they are... a minor House."  
  
"It is shameful that you should be outcast from your family for being more powerful than they," the Singer said. "That is the heart of why the Dragon- Blooded hate those such as you or me. I, too, was once outcast, and driven out to die. But the Bitter Maiden of the Devouring Sorrow lifted me up and Exalted me, just as you were Exalted."  
  
"Not just as I was," Nil couldn't help but shoot back.  
  
"No, not yet. It is but a matter of time. The one inevitability is death, and one day, you and Golden Fortune will belong to us, one way or another."  
  
"But not today."  
  
Again, that warm smile. "No. Not today. Would you hear the price for the location now?"  
  
"Once I have the name..."  
  
"You wll never find him," drawled the Singer. "He has unlocked a hidden Manse of great power. Unless you know what to look for, you will never find it."  
  
"Very well. First the name, and then the price, and I will decide if I wish to pay it."  
  
"Tinch. Once a respected sorcerer, now Anathema. As for my price to learn where he is, you must attend services tonight, and stay until I declare them over. I must at least make a token effort to show you the beauty of the powers I serve."  
  
"No!" Fortune finally spoke, his voice harsh, roughened by horror. "I can't! I couldn't!"  
  
"You must," purred the Singer. Nil could tell the priestess had the weight of the inevitability she preached behind her. Really, they had no choice.  
  
"I'll be with you." Nil laid her hand on Fortune's.  
  
"I wish we'd never come here," he whispered, but his tone was one of helpless capitulation.  
  
Again, the Singer smiled. "Wish as you will, one day you will still taste the peace of death. I offer to you not only the chance to feel it and to see it, but to join us in our cause."  
  
"I would never join you!" Fortune's outrage overwhelmed his apprehension.  
  
The Singer rose from her couch in a smooth, languorous motion, and moved close enough to stroke her fingertips against Fortune's cheek. He tensed, as if meaning to recoil, but did not move away, eyes fixed on her pale and lovely face.  
  
"One never knows what might happen under the right circumstances," she murmured. She stepped back to encompass both Nil and Golden Fortune in her gaze. "The ceremony begins at midnight. You may be in the front, as our honored guests, but get some rest. We will continue until the darkest hour."  
  
"You cannot make us worship," Nil replied, standing. She was shorter and smaller than the statuesque Singer, but knew herself to be every bit as formidable. Or at least she hoped she conveyed that impression.  
  
"Why would I wish to?" The Singer sounded almost hurt by the suggestion. "Worship that is not freely given is not worship. But do not be so quick to dismiss that which you do not understand. Please, rest and refresh yourselves here. An attendant will come to bring you in time for the ceremonies."  
  
The moment the priestess departed, Golden Fortune turned on Nil. "Don't you see that woman is evil? She's going to do something! She's going to force you to break the pact and kill us both!"  
  
"I know she is," Nil replied. "She doesn't want us dead, though. She wants us alive. She wants us like her. No matter what we see, no matter what is done, we have to hold fast until dawn. We need what she knows." She tilted her hat forward over her eyes to catch some much needed sleep. "If we want to find this Tinch and your sister, and free your friends from Talt, it all starts here, and we're going to have to play along. She can't do anything to us unless we break the rules of hospitality – so let's not blow it."  
  
Fortune's anger petered out quickly. Nil could no longer see him, but heard him sigh, defeated. "I just don't know if I can do this..."  
  
"You'll be alright," Nil said, before drifting off. She was of a warrior race, and warriors caught what sleep they could when they could get it.  
  
There were dreams. There were always dreams, these days. And as was becoming more and more common, this dream involved the cask she carried. Once, in an Age long dead, it had belonged to her. It was... it was...  
  
...In her mind's eye was a great cage of jade, and inside were hundreds of sun-bright motes, swirling, striving to be free...  
  
..."I see their minds!" It was the man Nil loved. Or once loved. "The truth will be known! Must be known!" He was no Twilight Caste savant, but no less brilliant for all that. Before him, on an altar to the Unconquered Sun was a cask of black wood bound in orichalcum, and a knife of that same magical metal...  
  
"My mistress summons you." Nil struggled out of the fog of dreams to look into a dead face, and it was all she could do to stay herself from drawing her sword. The dead man exited even as Nil arose. Golden Fortune was pacing the room, his face tortured.  
  
"Come on," Nil said, taking his arm. "Let's get this over with."  
  
Arms linked, the pair walked into silence like the grave. It was night in the shadowland outside, so every inhabitant, even the incorporeal dead, was strikingly visible, even in the cavernous gloom of the temple. Especially in the gloom of the temple. A few dozen mortal worshippers knelt, all gathered toward the front, and in the back and lining the walls were the dead and the undead, waiting with hungry expectation.  
  
The Singer's voice broke the silence as the pair of Solars descended the dais and passed the altar. "Behold! The night grows in power, as the Sun lies slumbering in a precursor to the day when the light shall die at last. On that one, ceaseless night, we will all be enfolded into that eternal, comforting darkness, and the world shall be at peace."  
  
There were two unoccupied mats for Nil and Fortune only ten feet from the priestess, a place of honor, to be certain – an honor Nil fervently did not want. She folded her legs and sat, pulling Fortune down next to her.  
  
The Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge had changed. She was still striking, but her robes and veils had been exchanged for layer after layer of diaphanous fabric draped from her lush figure. Even in the dim light, certain of her movements threw she shadows of her form beneath into stark silhouette.  
  
"Did I not foretell their coming?" cried the Singer, arms upraised. The congregation moaned their assent. "Two scions of the Unconquered Sun come to us, in search of the wisdom only the whispers of Neverborn could grant. And so, a special ceremony is prepared." The Singer stretched her arms out to the living, the dead, and the undead. "Tonight, we celebrate the transcendant power of death over the transitory nature of life! Tonight, we demonstrate the glory of our inevitability! Bring forth the first of the chosen!"  
  
Guided by a pair of dark-robed acolytes, a young villager, weary and ravaged from illness, came up the aisle in the center. The dead in the wings moaned in awful anticipation, and the young man was helped to kneel. A knife flashed in the Singer's hand, and she held it high above the man before her. Nil felt her skin crawling with rising horror and steeled herself against what she knew was coming. Fortune's hand found hers and fastened tight.  
  
The Singer intoned, "Do you give up the burden of life for the surcease of pain to be found in death of your own free will? Do you give yourself over to the glory of the Neverborn?" Her rich and vibrant voice throbbed with fervent exultation.  
  
"I do," whispered the kneeling man. Without further preamble, the Singer seized him by the hair and cut his throat. As the blood sprayed out in a cloud of unnaturally bright crimson, the Singer flared into dark fire, surrounded in blackness like a wound in Creation itself. In that unlight, the Singer stood out all the sharper, and the blood was all the brighter.  
  
Nil felt dizzy with horror, not only at the killing, but at the nagging suspicion within her that perhaps the man was too sick to be cured... that perhaps his death was for the best. In the presence of the Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge, disbelief was a very difficult thing. Golden Fortune moaned, a low, helpless sound, but the noise was lost in the groaning of the dead and the undead that surged from the shadows to consume the still-warm offering.  
  
As the small living congregation prostrated itself, the priestess lifted her low, crooning voice in a paean to her masters, gently laying the corpse of the young man to the ground. A hazy shape formed above the freshly dead young man, growing stronger with the rise and fall of the Singer's voice. Minutes stretched by and the shape became clearer – it was the ghost of the young man, strengthened by the unholy ritual, and the darkness of oblivion burned in his dead eyes.  
  
A black disk appeared on the Singer's forehead, crackling with energy the color of newly spilt blood. Still she continued to sing, and the new ghost stood aside and behind the Singer, in quiet deference.  
  
It was a caste mark, Nil realized. This woman was Exalted, just as she claimed, as she herself was, as Golden Fortune was, but perverted in some unspeakably horrible way. The truth touched her like a sliver of ice through her heart. If the Unconquered Sun could Exalt a mortal, why not whatever gods the Singer worshipped? And that was at the heart of this ritual, of the Singer's 'hospitality'. She wanted to make the two Solars into Exalted like herself.  
  
Oblivious to the horrified Solars, the Singer sang on. Another was brought forth, a young woman whose husband had died, whose child by him was stillborn. She would meet them again, promised the Singer before spilling the young woman's blood. The dead fed on her as her ghost was sung into being. Blood dripped from the edges of the Singer's caste mark, red tracks down her white skin.  
  
There was a third volunteer, an elderly man. Then a fourth, another widow, this one of middle age. Golden Fortune had begun weeping, uncontrollably, some time before. Nil's dizziness only grew, the undeniable power of the Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge throwing her off-balance, muddling her thoughts. If she left, she would break her end of the bargain, and be left to finding scraps of shadows of rumors to find Tinch. But if she stayed... if she stayed... she didn't know what would happen. It had been hours and the mortal worshippers were still rapt, breathless in awe as one after the other of them was slaughtered. Nil took the last act of defiance left to her. She began to pray.  
  
Nil was never a pious woman – not like Ledaal Niloba, her Dragon-Blooded friend from her former life. She paid lip-service to the Dragons, but what faith she had dwindled when her brother Exalted, then the Ledaal twins, while Nil herself remained a lowly mortal. The Dragons did not choose to Exalt Nil, but the Unconquered Sun did, and so it was to him Nil directed her fumbling but earnest prayers. Beside her, Golden Fortune continued to sob, inconsolably.  
  
The copper smell of blood and the fervent moaning of the living and the dead receded, and a comforting warmth spread over Nil. The fog in her mind was broken, like the sun burning away morning mist, and it was then she realized the heat was not merely spiritual. It radiated from the cask on her back. The silence was also real, the ceremony interrupted, the Singer's voice stilled. Nil opened her eyes and looked out through a halo of golden light – not pale, like her usual anima, but the brightness of noon.  
  
"Blasphemy," whispered the Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge. Then, louder, "Blasphemy!" Nil knew then that the object she carried had broken the pact for her. She rose and had to drag Fortune with her.  
  
"Snap out of it!" she hissed at him, shaking his arm. But he only wept all the harder, as though something inside him had broken. The dead recoiled, unable to face the radiance that billowed from Nil in silent waves. Slowly, she started to back out, and the congregation parted.  
  
"Kill them!" The Singer's voice echoed with her unholy power. "Kill them and bring them into our fold!"  
  
The dead could not obey, driven back by the light of the Unconquered Sun, but some of the living certainly could. Black-robed acolytes surged forward, along with a few brave villagers. Nil didn't want to kill any of them, but neither did she wish to give the Singer the satisfaction of her death. Either way, she would play into the Singer's hands by providing more death, but one way would allow her to one day return and cast down this temple so no more would die to feed Oblivion. She drew her sword.  
  
Hampered by the need to support and defend Golden Fortune, Nil did not have her usual speed, but what she did have was sufficient. Her sword flashed and more blood was spilled. She wove a shield of flashing steel with her blade that no attack could penetrate, and when an attacker overstepped his boundaries, he was cut down. The moaning of the wounded and dying soon rose in counterpoint to the anguished moaning of the dead – and over it all, the exultant laughter of the Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge. Many more souls would be entering the halls of her masters tonight, driven there by their fervent devotion, ushered there by a scion of the Unconquered Sun.  
  
"Between day and night is the Tower of the Descending Sun," the Singer's was no longer laughing, her voice whispering in Nil's ear as if they stood right next to each other. "It looks over the north, over Kirighast – if you look with the right eyes at the right time." The attacks ceased – most of those brave enough to attack Nil were no longer able to do so. "It was good meeting you, my unwilling missionary. I look forward to doing so again." The Singer mounted the dais and vanished behind the curtain.  
  
At that moment, outside the shadowlands, the Sun was rising. Dawn was breaking. The ghosts vanished with a final, anguished wail, and the mortals left alive cowered in fear. It was over. The undead left behind were only able to glare balefully at Nil's sun-bright aura, and the only sound was Golden Fortune's ceaseless sobbing.  
  
It took hours, but Nil left the temple, and the town, behind, bloody sword grasped firmly in one hand, dragging the insensate Fortune with the other. Step by slow step, they left behind the Desert of Plague's Triumph, and took a new course to the north, to the city of Kirighast. The light flickered and faded from around Nil once they left the shadowland.  
  
For three days, Golden Fortune could do nothing but weep. He would not eat, and would only move when guided by Nil. She began to wonder if the Singer had done to him what she could not do to Nil – break his spirit and shatter his will. If she had been forced to leave him, would he be even now singing his praises to the power of death? She knew she had begun to wonder what was so wrong with what she was seeing until the light of the Unconquered Sun cleared her mind.  
  
They were in a tiny cave on a hillside one night, when Fortune finally spoke. "I'm sorry, Nil." He sounded stronger, somehow, as if his long outburst had cleansed him in some way. "I just couldn't watch any longer." His eyes lifted to meet hers. "She wants us, you know. She wants us to go out and kill and kill and kill until the entire world is dead. The horror just... it..."  
  
Nil just nodded and put her hand on his shoulder. She sincerely hoped the Unconquered Sun would strike her down before she ever gave herself over to such evil. But then, who could know what temptations might come to her in the future?  
  
She cradled the cask in her hands. Blood had been spilled because of the Unconquered Sun's power in that strange artifact, and it had only fed the darkness. The Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge made much of inevitability, and what had occurred in the temple only seemed to bare out her words. Not next time, Nil promised herself. Next time, the meeting would be on her own terms. She told herself that, then spent the rest of the night trying to make herself believe it. 


	4. The Tale of Golden Fortune

Golden Fortune felt a new clarity, a new purpose in his life. It seemed to him like every time he was broken by life, he only arose to become stronger. This time, that someone was the woman walking silently next to him.  
  
He glance at her, this confident and powerful woman of whom he knew so little. She didn't look like much – just a spoiled and lost patrician brat in dusty and worn finery. Which was generally what she was, by her own confession. Fortune knew at least that much about her. That priestess of abominations in the shadowland a week behind them had forced Fortune's companion to speak her real name – Anjis Maret. Fortune wouldn't be surprised Anjis wasn't the name of a Dragon-Blooded House, or that the woman who now called herself Nil, rather than Maret, wasn't the target of a rather focused Wyld Hunt. The Dragon-Blooded were particularly unhappy when the Anathema was spawned from one of their own.  
  
Nil may have been forced to give her real name, but Golden Fortune had been forced into much worse. The temple to the dark powers in the Desert of Plague's Triumph had broken him as surely as had the betrayal by his own mother or the sordid circumstances of his birth in the first place. Death after ritualized death had made him burst into uncontrollable and shameful weeping. A black fog choked his senses and he knew little more until he woke in a cave three nights later, far from that accursed place.  
  
Golden Fortune had been saved by his companion, guided by her fierce tenacity and unwavering will. She would probably never know how much he admired her – how he was willing to die on her behalf. Then again, with her keen way of seeing to the heart of things, maybe she did. He relied upon her, an admission that was difficult to make, even if it was only in his own heart.  
  
"Nil," he began nervously, out of the blue, "you really think this Tinch is going to be able to help us?"  
  
She looked at him, one fine eyebrow lifted. She was a small woman, and a pretty one, even if the days of walking had left her somewhat unkempt. Black hair, tilted brown eyes, fair skin, a bold nose, and full lips characterized her – a Blessed Isle patrician's face if there ever was one.  
  
"Of course. But I'd still look for him even if he was just a Solar. We need to stick together." Just as Fortune was focused on finding his lost sister, so was Nil focused on finding others of their kind. "Even if he doesn't know anything about the cask, its on our way. Harborhead's a good place to start looking for your sister."  
  
"My sister." Fortune chuckled without much humor. "My friends, my so-called 'gang' was scared of me, there at the end, even though I was their way out of Talt. I hope she's not, when we find her. I'm Anathema, you know. She might prefer the people keeping her over me."  
  
"Maybe," Nil said, smiling at him in that way she had. He felt better before she even said anything. "Doesn't mean we shouldn't give it a try, right?"  
  
Fortune smiled back, reassured. "No, I guess not. It's just that, sometimes, I miss not being something like a god, even though back before I was Exalted, I wished I could live almost any other life."  
  
Nil listened, giving Fortune her full attention. She was good at that, so good that the rest of his story came tumbling out.  
  
This, then, was the tale of Golden Fortune.  
-------------------------------------------------  
My mother was the lowest of the low in Varang – the outcast, and I guess she was set on passing that distinction on to her children. She was so charming and so beautiful, forced by an accident of birth and timing into becoming a drug-addled low-class whore. I'm not making up excuses for her, but there are only three professions for an outcast in a Varang city: whore, criminal, or laborer. At least as a whore she could afford the drugs that kept her going on from day to day.  
  
She never really looked after me, though I looked after her when I was older. The various outcasts had kids of their own, and there were orphans, too, and we sort of raised each other. They took me in, then my sister when she was born a year after me. My little group was composed of pickpockets and shoplifters, and I was one of them almost as soon as I could walk. And I was good at it. I was like a mascot to my pack. I don't know what my mother named me, or if it was ever anything more than "Boy", but it was my packmates that named me Golden Fortune.  
  
I had a knack. No stall or pocket was safe from my wandering hands. Every evening I'd bring handfuls of things to share and still have some to give a little to my mother, who I still cared for back then. It wasn't really much, but to our little family of outcasts, it was like rare treasure. When I got older, I formed my own little group, which you met – I could have been leader of my own pack, but I didn't want that. Bigger groups were too easy for the guards to find.  
  
You've met my gang, Nil, such as it was, all except my sister. My old pack named her Joyous Orchid, because she was always so bright and happy, however bad things got. She was the one who lifted our spirits and kept us from just giving up and dying. Orchid was so beautiful, too. I could see in her what my mother had been before the drugs had ruined her mind and her soul. She never had to steal a thing. Just a smile would get her what she wanted. I'll bet anything that her beauty, and her sweet, trusting nature was her downfall.  
  
My closest friends, the ones I left behind in Talt, they were like siblings, too. Fiery Deia with the flame-red hair was good at keeping the guards off our backs. She was fierce as a lion and twice as mean. More suspicious than the guards could ever hope to be, she kept us one step ahead. Verchey was the oldest, big and broad. He liked to keep his head bald as an egg. He kept the bigger thugs away from us. And there was Kallest. He was the quick and agile one. He wasn't very brave, really, but he was easily the smartest of us.  
  
You met them all when you were chasing me through Talt. Kallest was the one who told you everything, naturally, and Deia was the one who wouldn't talk. But it was Orchid who was the heart of us. That's who this is all about. Just about half a year ago, she vanished. I came back to the latest safehouse to find her gone, and none of us knew where she went. We all loved Orchid and were frantic to find her.  
  
Kallest, the quickest thinker, was the one who suggested that she might have gone to see our mother. I went to see her alone, which was a mistake. She was so glad to see me, and assured me that Orchid was with her, and everything was fine. And when she was leading me to where my sister was, someone hit me from behind and I blacked out.  
  
I woke up in chains and in darkness. I couldn't move, and without my tools, I couldn't pick the lock I could just touch with my fingertips. I was cramped in some kind of chest, which was moving somewhere. I could tell by the bouncing. I'm not ashamed to say I started to panic – I had no idea what was going on. Just when I started to struggle, though, light filled the tiny space I was in, and a voice filled my soul.  
  
"You who have known only injustice will now be my justice. Cast off your chains and in my name strike off the bonds of the oppressed, bring hope to the downtrodden, and cast down tyranny. I am the Unconquered Sun, and I Exalt you."  
  
The voice faded, but the light was still there. And my chains went slack as the lock opened at my touch. I rapped the inside of the chest's lock and it came open as well, and I burst out, ablaze with golden fire.  
  
Cries of "Anathema" went up, even as I hit the ground with a splash. I was in a sewer, not far from the secret exit from the city I planned to use when I made my own attempt at escape later. There were three men in the wide tunnel, two big ones bearing the chest, and a smaller one, clearly the leader. He had a knife at his side and I rolled through the shallow muck, stood next to him and snatched his weapon from his belt.  
  
The braver of the two bearers came at me and I threw the knife through his knee. He fell over onto his face. I was unarmed and the two left turned on me, then. Even as I backed away, the knife came back into my empty hand. That's when the two left standing tried to run. The second bearer I had to kill – I couldn't let anyone get away. The knife hit him in the skull. I called the weapon back in enough time to hit the knee of the leading kidnapper, and then he was at my mercy.  
  
It was from this man, this slaver that did work for the Guild, that I found out the nature of the deal they'd made with my mother. They were to sell us both, 'beautiful, young, and unspoiled' on the slave market, in exchange for a rather large sum, which my mother then used to flee the city. The authorities of Talt would have frowned highly on such a transaction were they to find out.  
  
I let him go, and I doubt that slaver ever came back to Talt again. I guess he could have reported me, but then he'd have to admit to buying slaves illegally, too. I wish I'd followed him, now, but my thoughts were on finding my mother. But the time I emerged from the sewers, the light around me had faded, but my mother was already long gone.  
  
I never told the others the full details about what had happened, only that we were going to get out of Talt and find Orchid. With my new skills, I started building up a small fortune so I could chase the slavers down. We were the best fed group of thieves in Talt for several weeks, but my dreams kept pushing me to move on. I remembered what the Night Caste was in the First Age, and I was ashamed to be a petty thief instead of a bringer of justice.  
  
Despite my shame, I felt the need to wait. Another thing was in my dreams – a hazy vision at first, but it became clearer over time. It was the cask, all black wood and shining orichalcum. The Unconquered Sun wanted me to have it. When word came to me of the arrival of the cask, I had to have it.  
  
I was able to steal your note from the messenger, then change my appearance to match yours, with my gang acting as my retinue. I used my entire stolen fortune to buy that cask, then stole my money back. The use of so much Essence wore me out, so I rested a little before leaving the city – which is how you found me.  
-------------------------------------------------  
"I've never felt more full of hope that everything will turn out alright since you swore to help me find my sister. I feel like the Unconquered Sun is guiding me to Orchid, through you, and to free my friends – I trust you now, just like I trusted them."  
  
Nil smiled, not in the usual devil-may-care way, but in what Fortune felt was honest fondness. "I feel the same way about you. I never had a gang or a pack, except my Dragon-Blooded friends. Then, I was just a mortal. And now, I'm Anathema." The smile dropped away. "You're my family now. I may not have the visions you do, but I feel the path we're on will lead us into a fellowship closer than brothers – into a bond unseen since the First Age."  
  
She spoke with such conviction that Fortune could only agree. He looked forward now to meeting this Solar sorcerer, this Tinch.  
  
Onward they rode, to the Tower of the Descending Suns. 


	5. Interlude: A Night on the Road

There would be four, her spies told her, and they were right, of course. She had to be careful to remain unseen, and sure in her course. The powers she served had guided her here, and could be the night all things turned irrevocably in her favor. Wrapped in her veils and funereal dress, the Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge kept herself well-hidden, crouched in a shallow depression in the hillside.  
  
It was four that the Singer needed to be aware of, for it was on them that tonight's events would hinge. Four Terrestrial Exalted doing the work of the Malfeans. She had to smile. A score of mortal soldiers trailed them – fodder for the Anathema the four hunted. There would be only death for those poor mortals, no matter what. They were only distractions to better serve the main goal of killing Anathema. Win or lose, they all served her cause. Still, she was here to nudge things a bit, to make matters sure. She longed to have those Solars in her hand, weakened and desperate, and each stain on their souls would bring them ever closer to wholeheartedly embracing the darkness.  
  
In the lead below, riding at a canter along the hard and dusty road was a fiery-haired, fierce-eyed warrior woman. Her back was as straight as her dire lance, and she was full of purpose. The Singer's spies had named her Ledaal Niloba, and she was a child of the Elemental Dragon of Fire. It was her life's goal to kill the Solar Anathema that was once her friend, Anjis Maret, who now called herself Nil.  
  
Slightly behind Niloba was her twin sister, Ledaal Linopa. Bark-brown hair and green-tinged skin marked her as Wood Aspect Dragon-Blood. She was kind where her sister was fierce, an odd quality for a Dynast, but then, there were many unusual things about the Ledaal twins, or so the Singer had been told. Linopa was only there for the sake of her sister. She had no desire to kill anyone, let alone someone she once considered a friend.  
  
Plodding behind the twins was a broad-backed Aspect of Earth, his mighty shoulders slumped under the weight of his mission. This would be Anjis Pren, brother to Maret. His despair and conflict called to the Singer. He was the weak link. Niloba was consumed with fervor, Linopa with devotion to her sister, but Pren honestly loved his sister and could never truly believe that such a brilliant soul had been given over to demonic powers. He might be able to bring himself to kill her, out of duty and his love for Niloba, but he himself could very well break in the process.  
  
Last of the four was the monk with the unassuming name of Sparrow. He rode amongst the mortals but was not one of them, an Exalted monk of some kind. At least that was the impression the Singer got. Even under the most assiduous questioning, her spies were never able to tell her much about this man. It didn't matter, the Singer decided ultimately. He, too, would die. They would face three Solars, instead of just one, and die, for they would face the Solars alone.  
  
Night was falling and the Singer's hour would soon be at hand.  
  
The roadside hostelry wasn't much, but it was better than sleeping on the side of the road. Niloba let Linopa handle the detail of securing rooms while she herself got the troops in order. They knew she would brook no shirking or hesitation or any lack of discipline and her every command was carried out with alacrity.  
  
While the men went about their orders, Pren slouched past her and went inside, without a word. Niloba was still glad he had come, nonetheless. He was so much less than he used to be, the steady rock of his presence was slowly eroding. She had asked him to come because he had to understand – he had to see what his sister had become, and avenge her by putting the demon in her skin to the sword.  
  
Truly, though, Niloba wasn't surprised little Maret had succumbed to the temptations of the Anathema. She was always striving so hard to fit in among her betters. Maret had been a truly exceptional mortal, and if her soul had been advanced enough, she would have been a truly formidable Dragon-Blood. But there were flaws within her, and Exaltation was not for her in this life. Niloba could see Maret would never have accepted her destiny, and so wasn't surprised that she took another avenue of power, probably inadvertently allowing herself to be destroyed. Maret had been a sweet and charming thing, but Ledaal Niloba would shed no tears when her lance pierced the demon's heart.  
  
Inside, Linopa had negotiated what accommodations she could. The soldiers would be housed in a common room – they were used to barracks, while the Exalted would share two adjoining rooms. They had much to discuss.  
  
Sparrow was troubled. Everything was preceding entirely too well. Fate, due to the vagaries of free will and Essence was rarely so ordered unless there was a guiding hand, and Sparrow knew very well that hand did not belong to him or one of his brethren., and he'd be damned if he knew just whose it was. Damned. Sparrow immediately regretted that line of thought. The manipulations of demons and the dead were hidden from his sight – could they be somehow involved?  
  
His three Dragon-Blooded companions talked around him as though he wasn't there. Actually, Niloba did most of the talking while the others were pulled along in her wake, drawn by love and duty and Niloba's bright fanaticism. Oh, how the Inner Circle was proud of this one. If she didn't die killing Anathema, she would go far in the world created by the Exalted of the Maidens. But the others, poor listless Pren, and sad-eyed Linopa, they would surely be burned to a husk by Niloba's fervor, torn between their love for her and their love for a friend fallen into darkness whom they had come to kill.  
  
It didn't really matter what they said or what happened to them – Sparrow had come to see the work of Creation done – and if that furthered his own personal goals, so much the better.  
  
It was midnight, and the ambush was both swift and silent. Impervious to the blows of mortals, the walking dead came out of the shadows and murdered the keeper of the hostel and every last servant, most in their sleep. Even as they breathed their last, the unliving soldiers slunk inside to follow their assignments. The largest group went to the private rooms, while to the occupied common room went a knot of zombies, among them the Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge.  
  
Just as the mortal soldiers were fodder to the Anathema, so were these undead fodder against the Wyld Hunt. The Singer had come for two purposes only – the first was to slay the Hunt's mortal hounds.  
  
Niloba was already awake when the monk... what was he called?... Sparrow... when Sparrow came to her pallet to wake her. She put a finger to her lips and nodded. Something was wrong. With Sparrow, she woke the other two, cautioned them into silence and listened.  
  
At first, there was only a deep and ominous silence, and then from down the hall came a faint hymn, beautiful enough to break the heart. It was a solemn dirge so weighted with pain and sorrow that Niloba felt tears spring to her eyes and her heart falter within her...  
  
"Oh, merciful Mela!" gasped Sparrow. The usually passive monk was deadly pale. "Cover your ears, if you love your life!" He had already followed his own advice.  
  
The others all obeyed instantly, and Niloba found herself swaying on her feet. The few notes she had heard had left her feeling hollow, weak, and sick, though the sensations were even now fading. What was happening?  
  
The tramp of booted feet on the stairs stopped any speculations and muted the sounds of the distant and poisonous dirge. They were under attack. This, Niloba understood to her very bones. Freed from the deadly voice, she picked up her dire lance and prepared herself.  
  
A number of the soldiers were struggling from their pallets, even as the Singer crooned her hymn. They struggled, but it was all in vain. Most of them slumped to the ground, exhaling the sigh of their final breaths as the dirge drew from them their very lives.  
  
Methodically, the few undead that she had brought with her pinned those to their beds that were too slow to die. And still some fought, dying where they stood or spitted on the weapons of the zombie soldiers.  
  
One of the living, likely the captain, broke through, bleeding copiously, spear poised to impale the Singer. Checking a sigh at the foolish tenacity of mortalkind, she stilled her song and met his eyes, showing him the futility of his struggle. Oblivion filled his soul and he fell, spear clattering to the ground, a moan of utter anguish escaping his lips.  
  
The Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge held up a hand to stay the killing of the remaining soldiers. Now, they belonged to her. From above came the sound of splintering wood. The battle would soon be joined.  
  
A smile lit the Singer's face, a warm and open smile that led so many into the arms of Oblivion. She had come for two things, and one was accomplished. There was time for a little something extra.  
  
Her smile became sharp with fangs.  
  
Ledaal Linopa was not a warrior. She was most at home among her plants and her books. She wished fervently that she had never come. But when the moment of battle came, she was every bit an Emerald Dragon. The door shuddered from a mighty blow and Linopa summoned her anima, an aura of green light waving like a field of tall grass. In her hand was her powerbow, arrow already nocked.  
  
To one side of the door stood Anjis Pren, daiklaive held in a ready stance, his anima shining around him in a diamond-bright halo. On the other side stood Sparrow. The monk's hands cut the air in a blur of motion as he assumed the Air Dragon Form. Before the door, in front of Linopa, stood Niloba, dire lance set for the charge of the enemy. Linopa drew the string on her bow.  
  
The door burst open in a shower of splinters and undead monsters in rusted armor lurged through in a steady stream. Unmoving except for his mighty arms, Pren removed legs and arms and heads with impunity, and the doorway was quickly clogged with the immobile bodies of incapacitated zombies. Bones were shattered by Sparrow's hands, the monk driving enemy after enemy to its knees, only to have its skull broken. Niloba danced forward and back, her lance like a darting tongue of flame, neatly and precisely skewering the advancing horde one by one.  
  
Even as she sent arrow after arrow into the ranks of the enemy, Linopa could not help but witness the joy of her sister as she fought. Doubtless Niloba would attribute this attack to Maret in some fashion, but Linopa couldn't help but feel they were being led by the nose, somehow.  
  
The battle was more cleanup than anything else. Hampered by their fallen comrades, the dead came on until their were no more to come. Niloba glanced back at her sister, as if to catch her thought, then scowled. Her anima flared into a bonfire, and she burned her way through the undead, fallen and unfallen alike, to see to the soldiers on the floor below.  
  
Linopa was the second in, once the undead were all taken care of, since she was the most versed in healing, but there was nothing to be done. They were all dead. There were a four zombies among them, inert, apparently defeated by the soldiers even as they themselves died. Most of the command they had brought, however, had been killed by the haunting dirge, their corpses withered. Still others had been pinned to the floor as they slept by sword and spear. Most horrifying to Linopa was how some of the corpses had apparently been fed upon. Puncture wounds from fangs marked their pallid throats.  
  
"Do you see what that... that... monster had called to block our path?" Niloba's voice trembled with righteous rage as she turned to Linopa, and Pren who had come up behind. "We must kill her when we find her, and we cannot hesitate! So much corruption." With the clarity that sometimes happened between sisters, especially sisters so close as them, Linopa could see Niloba was almost sick with horror – but bolstered by fervor. Still flaring like a torch, Niloba knelt next to the dead captain of the company. The look of absolute despair fixed on his face would wake Linopa in the night, for many nights to come. His throat, too, bore the mark of fangs.  
  
Niloba strode to the door, anxious to catch the perpetrator, only to be blocked by Pren, who didn't quite seem to know he was blocking the way.  
  
"You don't know it was Maret..." Pren began reflexively, his deep voice plaintive and without hope.  
  
"Who else?" Niloba snapped. "Damn it, Pren, Maret is gone. If you loved your sister, you would want to kill the monster in her skin as much as I do." Her flaming anima licked against his diamond-bright one as she brushed past him. The resigned slump returned to Pren's broad shoulders as he followed.  
  
Linopa pressed the heel of her hand to her forehead, wishing all of these had never happened. She focused her thoughts on the monk's prayers for the dead in the background. She'd heard the argument too many times. As much as she hated to admit it, this could only have something to do with Maret. It was too much of a coincidence, otherwise. As much as she didn't want to believe it, it was looking more and more like Anjis Maret was the Anathema Niloba so deeply believed she was.  
  
Sparrow went through his prayers for the dead in automatic motions. He was constructing what had truly happened, filtering it through what he knew as a Chosen of the Maiden of Secrets rather than through the limited understanding offered by the Immaculate Philosophy. The murders here were clearly the work of an Abyssal, who could very well still be about. They were being herded by the servants of the Deathlords, and whatever interest they could have in this hunt could only work toward evil.  
  
Why did this deathknight sacrifice so many to kill these mortals? To make Sparrow and his team more vulnerable. Sparrow knew it as surely as he knew anything. They were being lured into a trap for the purposes of the Underworld, now when turning aside would mean losing their quarry. And Niloba would certainly never give up. She'd go on alone if she had to. Perhaps Sparrow could convince her to find an Imperial outpost or satrapy and find reinforcements...  
  
"Where day and night meet...." The voice was wet-sounding, breathy and labored, rising from the throat of one of the fallen undead. It spoke again, as both Sparrow and Linopa turned to it, its voice rising in unison with a second zombie's.  
  
"...stands the Tower of the Descending Suns..."  
  
Sparrow swallowed a gasp. Tinch! Tinch, at long last. He knew he was on the trail of the Solar sorcerer, but had no idea he was this close to the Tower he had sought for so long.  
  
Three of the zombies now spoke simultaneously. "...the Deceiver goes to meet the Unclean... look to the hills south of Kirighast..."  
  
Maret. The Eclipse Caste, renamed the Deceivers in the canon of the Immaculate Philosophy. Tinch could not be allowed to join with other Solars. He was dangerous enough on his own – he always had been, even before his Exaltation. Trap or not, he had to destroy Tinch, and if that meant destroying this Anjis Maret along the way, so much the better.  
  
Now all four zombies spoke in tandem. "...and as night fades, the stars will fade and die, the earth corrode, the trees rot, the wind still, and the fire turn cold."  
  
"You will not turn me aside!" Sparrow vowed. No, not after so long. He rushed outside, leaving the gaping Linopa behind. In the dark of night, Ledaal Niloba burned with holy fire, her anima flared high, and above her reared the image of a dragon of flame, a she searched the night. Even Sparrow's heart was stirred by the image. One day, this woman would lead nations.  
  
Behind, Ledaal Linopa and Anjis Pren bowed their heads. If it was from awe or love or terror or sorrow, Sparrow could not tell.  
  
They came after the Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge, but they found nothing. She watched from a hilltop, able to mark three of the Dragon- Blooded by their animas in the darkness. Some time later, Ledaal Niloba set the hostel aflame, aided by the monk to set the dead to rest.  
  
While they consigned the souls to the Dragons, the Singer murmured praise to her Neverborn masters. She had been led here to do a great work, and the lives of so many Exalted hung in the balance. On this could eventually hinge the control of much of the Southeast in the name of the Bitter Maiden of the Devouring Sorrow. It was time to return to the Desert of Plague's Triumph.  
  
The four walked on with purpose, little knowing that purpose was the cause of Oblivion. The Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge stretched her bloody lips into a smile.  
  
Night was waning, but the darkest hours were yet to come. 


	6. Somewhere Between Day and Night

South of Kirighast, in the rough hills, night was falling. Shadows pooled in a boulder-strewn valley as the sun lowered. A shadow shifted againt the fading light. It became more solid, more substantial, it rose into a tower reaching up into the sky as if to say farewell to the departing sun. It caught the dying rays, and the translucent stones were alive with golden fire, transforming the twilight of the valley into glorious day.  
  
Even as the tower ignited, a swirling wind stirred the stillness of the valley, and a small whirlwind touched down, in a cloud of obscuring dust. The wind spun itself out and a thin young man stumbled out of the cloud at a run.  
  
"Master Tinch! Master Tinch!" he screamed, between bouts of coughing, "It's true! The Wyld Hunt is coming –"And then he was inside, and the portal closed behind him.  
  
The sun set behind the hills, and the tower's light faded. In the space of minutes, it was one with the shadows once more, and gone as if it had never been.

* * *

"So cute. Weeks on the road and still as smooth as a baby's bottom!" Nil patted Golden Fortune's cheek. He shied away, blushing, even as he grinned. Nil's assertion wasn't true – Fortune had a deep (and appealing, in Nil's eyes) shadow of a beard on his youthful face. Too bad he was so young. She had no doubt he wouldn't kick her out of his bedroll, as it were, but she preferred a little more maturity. With her eye for such things, she could tell he'd become a little infatuated with her on the long way from Talt to the dusty kingdom of Harborhead, where they were today.  
  
Both of them were more than a little road-weary, hardened by and heartily sick of travel. Now they were passing though hills south of Kirighast, capital of Harborhead. They were almost at the end of the first leg of their journey.  
  
Golden Fortune rubbed at his fuzzy cheek, not quite looking at Nil as he did so. He is certainly going to break a lot of hearts one day, she thought to herself. Tall and dark, his hair thick and black, eyes nearly the same color as his hair – he was flatly beautiful. Hell, he was even better looking than she was, even after their weeks of traveling. He still dressed poorly, not ready to give up the grays and blacks of a Varang outcaste. Even were they not threadbare, his breeches and tunic would have been ugly.  
  
Nil wore cotton in blue and purple, with spots of color in the form of scarves and sashes in the flamboyant style she preferred (much to the distaste of her former Blessed Isle compatriots), but her finer clothing looked all the worse for the wear. She hoped she carried herself well, at least. It was in her breeding. But for her height, she was the very picture of a pure-bred woman of the Scarlet Empire. Her black hair, tilted dark eyes, fair skin, bold nose, and full lips had marked out her origins to the observant many times before.  
  
"It's night," Fortune pointed out. "It's pointless to look anymore. That woman –"He still couldn't bring himself to speak the name of the Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge, "—has sent us into a trap."  
  
"You know she hasn't." It was almost a rote response by this time, a daily reassurance they were on the right path. Ni knew the Singer had told the truth, though she had told it for reasons of her own. The goal of the priestess was to convert Nil and Fortune to her creed, or to see them destroyed. There was a trap involved, some subtle nudge to the Singer's plans, and Nil only hope she could see it before she was caught by it.

* * *

A flurry of wind disturbed the campsite of the two Solars as they stopped for the night. This was not what it was sent to see, but it was of interest, nonetheless. The sorcerer would find this of great interest. Without a sound, the winds moved on.

* * *

Ledaal Niloba was not certain when or how it happened, but it was now the priest that led them, rather than herself. In that doomed hostel, two weeks back, the voices of the undead had spoken something that had sparked Sparrow's resolved. Now, he rode with purpose. He assured Niloba they were more than sufficient to face any traps the Anathema might set, and Pasiap preserve her, she believed him every time. There was no denying she looked forward to it, though and she was glad someone was as resolved to see this done as she was.  
  
Linopa and Pren were more and more despondent as time went on, though Niloba suspected each had their own reasons. Pren still did not want to kill what he still, on some level, believed to be his sister. Linopa didn't want to ride into what she felt was an obvious trap, and was worried over what seemed to be an obsession. They were twins, and sometimes Niloba wondered at how Linopa didn't know her any better. This was no obsession, but a holy mission.  
  
They were close, and the Immaculate Dragons were with them. She could feel it.  
  
Dawn was just past, and they walked the trail through the hills with the purpose of the unerring, leaving their horses behind. There would be battle today.  
  
"We will find it tonight," Sparrow said, as if hearing Niloba's thought, and she thrilled to hear it. She was quite willing to let him lead the way. For now.

* * *

The old man appeared in a whirlwind on the narrow path ahead, not there one moment, then standing before them, hair wild, robes still whipping in the wind. As fast as he appeared, Nil was faster, her sword out and at the old man's throat before the dust settled.  
  
It was mid-afternoon, and twilight was only hours away.  
  
Quick as he was, Golden Fortune was still fumbling for his knife when the old man spoke in a querulous, age-roughened voice.  
  
"Why do you bring danger to my doorstep?" The old man was clearly angry, and just as clearly unbothered by the sword set to let out his life's blood. "Better yet, how did you know I was here? Since it must be me you're looking for, right?"  
  
Realizing who this was, Nil quickly put her sword away.  
  
"Master Tinch," she began, with a bow of her head, "we came alone seeking –"  
  
"Fool." Tinch cut her off abruptly. "You bring the Wyld Hunt! They must never find the way into the Tower. We will have to kill them, and kill them before dusk."  
  
The Wyld Hunt! Nil looked back at Fortune, and the horror was plain on his face.  
  
"Merciful Mela," she whispered. "Niloba. It has to be."  
  
Tinch leaned forward, leaning on a long walking stick. "Niloba? You know these people? Not only do you bring a Wyld Hunt, but one with a personal vendetta against you? You're more dangerous than they are!"  
  
"We don't have time for this!" Fortune spoke up, even as the glanced at the trail behind. "How many are there? Do they have any special weapons we need to worry about?"  
  
Tinch glared at the young man, but answered his question. "There are only three Dragon-Bloods, but there is another. A monk. He is named Sparrow, and he is the most dangerous of the bunch." He turned and started walking back up the path, expecting to be followed. Left with no other option, Nil and Fortune went along.  
  
"Sparrow is a Sidereal Exalt, at the old work of backstabbing his kind have perpetrated for eons now." Tinch clearly had some sort of grudge against this Sparrow. Nil could hear it in his voice.  
  
"So, it isn't necessarily us that brought them if you know this Sparrow the Sidereal," Nil said. "Whatever that is supposed to mean..." She trailed off when she caught sight of Fortune's stunned face.  
  
"I don't remember..." Fortune shook his head. "They were helping us. They were probably killed off by the Terrestrials, just like..."  
  
"Fools," Tinch said yet again, openly derisive. "If we all stumbled about so blindly before, it was no wonder we were all slain."  
  
Nil had never recalled the First Age so well as Golden Fortune, but now wasn't the time to indulge her curiosity. They had to survive the night first. They had to... A sick feeling gripped the pit of her stomach as she realized the Singer's plan. It was Niloba and Linopa. And Pren. If she were made to kill her own brother, her own friends...  
  
"Master Tinch, we can't kill any of them. They have to learn we're not murderous demons."  
  
That stopped the old man in his tracks, and he whirled to face his two younger companions.  
  
"They are here to kill us," Tinch said, his quavering voice now sharp as a knife's edge. "If they are not killed, they will come back again and again. You will endanger my home. They were dead the moment they decided to come after me. Remember that."  
  
"You said this Sidereal person was the only real danger, though. I am correct?" Nil was insistent. She had to be. The Singer of the Solemn and Endless Dirge would not win. Not this time. "I'll take care of the Dragon- Blooded. You can do what you have to do with Sparrow."  
  
Nil saw the old man's shoulders slump, she heard him sigh. "Exalted or not, young people are always idiots. Fine. If you can subdue them before twilight, they will be sent away. But I cannot risk them letting Sparrow into the Tower. Understood?"  
  
"Yes, sir." Nil agreed readily to that. Fortune gave her a troubled, but approving, smile. He had never much liked the idea of killing anything, anyway.  
  
They rounded a hill and began the descent into a stony valley, filled with vast boulders and deep shadows.  
  
"The Twilight Maze," Tinch explained. "This is where we will make our stand."  
  
Nil could see where the valley got its name. The afternoon sun was dimmed by the shadows of the hills, and the piles of tumbled rock surrounding them in virtual walls. In some places, it was difficult to tell where the shadows ended and the rock began. Tinch knew the way, however. They ended up in a cleared area from which they could see the sun going down behind the hills.  
  
"Soon, they will come," Tinch said. He leaned against his staff and waited.

* * *

Sparrow could feel he was being watched. Tinch was waiting. Even as he realized it, the challenge was issued. Light flared in a nearby valley, sun- bright, golden fire bursting from deep shadow.  
  
"They want us to come get them," Niloba said, moving alongside Sparrow. "Is it a trap or just a challenge?"  
  
"There is no trap but the sorcerer's own self-confidence," Sparrow assured her. "I will take care of him. The other Anathema I leave to you." Niloba wouldn't refuse. Her need to kill this Maret had become the cause of her life. It stood between her and Anjis Pren, whom she loved, it stood between her and her faith in the way the world should be.  
  
"Very well," she said, after a pause. Sparrow smiled faintly. It was so much easier when they cooperated.

* * *

Golden Fortune saw them first. He was crouched atop a rock and scuttled down the moment he spotted them. He was sure one of them had spied him – a big man at the very end of the group of four. No alarm was raised, however, at last not so Fortune could hear it.  
  
Tinch leaned against his staff, Nil against a rock. They looked almost bored. How could they be so calm? Four Exalts were coming to kill them.  
  
"They'll be here soon," he told the others, trying not to sound desperate. They knew, of course. Tinch had purposely drawn them by letting his anima show.  
  
Nil straightened up. "Was one a big man, an Aspect of the Earth Dragon? Two more, both women, one in a red breastplate, the other in green robes?"  
  
"...And Tinch's – Master Tinch's – monk, yeah," Fortune answered. As much as he admired Nil, her continued reticence about her past was starting to rankle. The lack of information could easily get them killed tonight. "You have your own personal Wyld Hunt after you? What did you do?"  
  
Nil flicked a sad, almost guilty glance at Fortune. "Same as you did. Exalted in the wrong way."  
  
"So blind." Tinch still leaned heavily on his staff. "Boy, it's obvious these are former friends of our obviously false-named compatriot. A lover? Siblings? Someone took 'Nil's' Exaltation personally."  
  
Nil's flinch told Fortune that Tinch was more than a little right.  
  
"I will engage Sparrow," the old man continued. "I advise you draw your opponents elsewhere, for your own safety. Three Dragon-Bloods should be no difficulty for a pair of Solars."  
  
Golden Fortune had his doubts about that, but didn't speak them aloud.  
  
"And here they come," Tinch said. For the first time, he sounded pleased.

* * *

A frontal assault was the only plan, other than Sparrow taking on the sorcerer alone. It was fine with Niloba. Maret had to be put down quickly, since her hellish powers had made her skillful enough to beat both Niloba herself and a Fair Folk noble. She has to be put down quickly and purged from their lives, so things could get back to normal, especially for Pren's sake.  
  
At long last, they were almost there.  
  
Light flared again, like a miniature sun, from behind the rocks just ahead. The Anathema challenged them, and Niloba was ready to answer. Without waiting for the others, Niloba ran forward and used her lance to vault over the high rocks. At the top of her arc, she fed Essence into her anima and wrapped herself in holy fire.  
  
In that instant, she saw the foe. Maret was almost directly below. Yards to her left was presumably the sorcerer, blazing gold and white, the vile light of the Anathema surrounding him. And there was another, a Southern boy, pressed against the rocks on the other side of Maret. She paid him no mind.  
  
Ledaal Niloba hit the ground, sweeping the tip of her lance in at Maret's chest, probing her defenses. No mortal could have blocked an attack of such speed, but Maret did so, her slender blade knocking aside each thrust with little apparent effort.  
  
"Niloba! Wait!" Maret back away, through a narrow passage between rocks, past the boy, away from the sorcerer. She assumed a defensive stance, retreating before Niloba's vicious jabs. "I'm not a demon! I'm still me!"  
  
Niloba stopped her ears to the lies of the Anathema. She hardened her heart. Blazing like a comet, she advanced again.

* * *

Foolish Terrestrials! Sparrow went around the rocks Niloba had vaulted over, Pren and Linopa close behind. He was relieved to see Niloba still alive, though that was doubtlessly only because the small swordswoman he assumed to be Maret was defending herself only. There was another, fearfully pressed against a rock, a Southern boy, a Varangan outcaste by the look of him, but he was of no consequence, at least no in the face of being so close to finally catching Tinch.  
  
The Solar sorcerer had ignited his anima and he still looked old, but no longer feeble. He had shed his facade and was now a Solar Exalted in all his glory. Sparrow had Exalted young, and remained the same, but Tinch's Exaltation had come to him in old age, but granted him the vigor of the young.  
  
"More fodder for the Imperial grist?" Tinch asked mildly as Pren and Linopa raced to join the fray against Maret. They quickly disappeared behind a wall of rocks, the Southern boy slinking after.  
  
"If you only understood the danger of people such as you," Sparrow said, honestly sad at his duty. The Solars could not be allowed to live, not under any circumstances. In them were the seeds of the world's destruction. It was terrible that young Maret had to die, but Tinch, he was a whole different magnitude of dangerous.  
  
Tinch invoked the Invulnerable Skin of Bronze and his skin was transformed into gleaming metal. Sparrow smiled grimly and made a sign of countermagic. Golden light bled away from Tinch, as the old man's defensive spell eroded.  
  
Sparrow had decades of Exaltation behind him, Tinch less than ten years. The battle would be brief.

* * *

Nil moved back, close to Golden Fortune, her sword at the ready, once they were in their own separate enclosure of the Twilight Maze. Pren and Linopa emerged, and now there were three, all arrayed against her. Niloba kept Nil at bay with her lance. Linopa nocked an arrow. Pren drew his daiklaive. Nil was good, but she doubted she could fight all three of them without someone dying. Despair weighed down her heart more than fear. Even so, her mind continued to work.  
  
First, she had to deal with Linopa. It was difficult enough to get behind Niloba's defenses without worrying about an arrow in the back. At the next thrust of Niloba's lance, Nil leapt up to the shaft of the weapon, then sprung from it, somersaulting over the Fire Aspect's shoulder, right at Linopa.

* * *

Now that he saw Maret, Pren's indecision grew only worse. She fought so gloriously, like she always had, holding her own against Niloba, protesting her innocence all the while. It was all in vain, though. Niloba would never let her guard down again. Eventually Maret would wear down, and Niloba's lance would find Maret's heart.  
  
But things were changing almost too quickly to follow. Maret was in the air over Niloba, sword raised high. She catapulted herself at Linopa. Pren acted on instinct, his the broad blade of his daiklaive sweeping up to knock Maret's sword aside with a resounding clang. Maret twisted in mid-air to land on her feet, facing Pren, the startled Linopa behind her now.  
  
"Damn it, I wasn't going to hurt her, Pren!" Maret was angry, but under it was desperation. Was it the desperation of a demon run to ground or of Pren's sister trying to earnestly persuade him she was still herself?

* * *

Behind Maret, Linopa drew her bowstring back again, the point of her arrow not more than ten feet from the Anathema. For Niloba's love, for Pren's soul, she let her arrow fly.

* * *

No one seemed to notice Golden Fortune, and he liked it that way. Nil seemed to be holding her own against the fiery-haired (and just plain fiery) Dragon-Blood. And then, the one in the green robes had tried to interfere.  
  
Nil was magnificent, but it was not enough when the big warrior with the big white-jade sword intercepted her path. In that moment of confrontation, Nil faced the massive swordsman, and an arrow was loosed at her back.  
  
The time for watching was over.  
  
Golden Fortune plucked his knife from his belt and threw it, and into that throw he poured the surety of the Unconquered Sun. His knife flared and roared with golden fire and soared true, not at the archer, but at her arrow, and shattered it mid-flight.

* * *

Niloba whirled to face the Southern boy. A third Anathema! This was likely the trap the undead had tried to send them into. They would learn to their sorrow the mettle of a child of the Dragons. Now, the boy was without a weapon, and she took her chance, pivoting to aim a vicious strike, the head of her lance bursting into flame.  
  
The boy wasn't looking, but he dodged nonetheless, swaying to one side, leaning just out of reach of Niloba's strike. He turned a fearful eye on her, and his knife sprang back into his hand, called by his unholy power. The fires of her anima roared about her as loudly as her battle cry as she renewed her attack.

* * *

"Damn it, Pren, I don't have time for this!" Nil was not oblivious to how Golden Fortune had saved her life. "He could have just as easily killed Linopa as stopped that arrow. Don't you see?"  
  
And speaking of Linopa... Nil ducked to the side, jumped, sprang from a rock, and launched herself at the archer again. This time, the arrow never got a chance to fly, as Nil's sword sliced right through the bowstring.  
  
Linopa gasped, and throw her bow to the ground, fingers twisting in arcane gestures to throw some spell or Charm – and there was Pren again, between the two women.  
  
And still, he did not attack.

* * *

Golden Fortune felt his forehead grow warm as he spun away from attack after attack. His Caste Mark was likely shining like a beacon.  
  
The Dragon-Blood woman was a whirlwind of fire, and it was taking all of Fortune's ability just to keep away from her. Essence made his motions fluid, but he could already feel himself dwindling, even as his anima flared brighter and brighter.  
  
Desperate, he puts his knife between his teeth, ducked backward under a thrust from the lance, and handsprung out of reach.  
  
Screaming defiance, trailing flame, the Fire Aspect came, and Fortune threw his knife, Essence guiding his throw to hit her knee in just the right spot. She tumbled to the ground in a resplendent ball of fire, even as the knife returned to his hand.  
  
Fortune raised his knife to throw again, but the woman surged upward in a burst of heat and light, exploding from prone to combat-ready in the space between breaths. The bright image of a dragon reared above her head, triumphant, as she backed Fortune into a wall, where there was nowhere further to run.

* * *

"Pren, let me save Fortune!" Nil knew the boy was no combatant, while Niloba was an accomplished warrior. She'd kill him sooner or later. Behind them both, she more felt than saw Linopa trembling, on the edge of tears.  
  
For the first time, Pren spoke, and his rumbling voice brooked no argument. "Drop your sword, Maret, and I will save him if I can."  
  
He was Anjis Pren, and he always kept his word. But more than that, he was her brother, and she loved him. She wanted him to know she was still the same sister he'd known all his life. Nil dropped her sword.

* * *

One Anathema down. Niloba drew her lance back for the killing blow, only to have her thrust blocked by a broad length of white jade.  
  
Niloba's gaze did not waver, nor did her lance drop. "Stand aside, Pren."  
  
"They surrender." Pren was steady as a stone, and often twice as stubborn. Niloba had spent months trying to convince Pren his sister wasn't some sort of exception to the evil of the Anathema. She had to free him, and the only way to do so was to kill Maret. For the sake of her love for him, she would break the hold of the Anathema upon him once and for all.  
  
Niloba withdrew her lance, planted the tip in the ground and spun, using her weapon to swing herself around Pren. Her burning feet lashed out to knock Maret to the ground, but the Anathema wove to one side, the evil sign on her brow shining brilliantly as she drew upon her power.  
  
"No!" Pren ran to stop Niloba, but he could never make it in time. Niloba landed with only a slight stumble from her numb leg, flipped her lance into position – and dropped it as a sharp twinge in her shoulder caused her arm to seize up. That boy with his knife!  
  
Pren had seized the boy in his granite grip by one arm, until he moaned in pain, but it was too late now. Niloba's leg and arm were useless. She could no longer fight. Her knee threatened to buckle, but she would not fall. No, if she were to die today, she would die on her feet.

* * *

The boy squirmed in Pren's grip, and would have died, if Pren had not realized Niloba was not really wounded. He'd seen masters of the Immaculate Arts perform the same sorts of attacks – she'd be fine in a couple hours, if aching. But he could have just as easily thrown that last knife through Niloba's throat.  
  
Everything he had ever been taught told him these were murderous demons, yet they were doing everything they could to avoid killing those that sought to kill them. If their powers were evil, perhaps they had not yet been overcome. Perhaps they could even be saved.  
  
"Niloba," he said, as gently as he could, "they surrender."  
  
"You are in thrall to her." Niloba's voice trembled in frustration and rage. "You will never be able to see it until your soul is gone."  
  
Pren looked at Maret who stood silently by. She looked much as she always had, if a but dusty from travel, and of course, the mark of the Deceivers plainly shining upon her brow like gold. She could have picked up her sword, but she didn't, standing straight and proud, as she looked back at her brother. He couldn't betray her. But he couldn't betray Niloba either.  
  
"We will take them to Sparrow, and he will decide." Pren saide. Niloba literally smoldered, but said nothing. The Southern boy gasped: "No!"  
  
"I doubt Sparrow will be deciding anything too soon." The querulous voice announced the arrival of the old man, and the brilliant glow surrounding him heralded his power. Dust swirled in a great cloud, and Sparrow was deposited at Niloba's feet, alive but limp and unmoving.

* * *

Now, the tables had turned. Nil had been ready to give herself up. It was better that than killing Pren and Linopa and Niloba and proving the Immaculates right. She would not fall into the Singer's trap. But now, the Wyld Hunt had been defeated. Pren and Linopa could still fight, but without Niloba and Sparrow, their chances of winning were slim.  
  
"I didn't surrender," Nil said to Pren. "But now, you must."  
  
"You're a fool," Tinch insisted yet again, but he was no longer grim with purpose, but flush with victory. He was practically crowing over the monk. "But now, they are no threat."  
  
It was twilight, and now a tower rose before them, blazing with the light of the Unconquered Sun. Even Pren gasped in awe.  
  
"Without Sparrow, they will never find their way back." Tinch made a vague gesture at the monk.  
  
"Is it the soul of the priest that you wanted then, sorcerer?" Niloba spat, and it hissed on the ground.  
  
"You are incredibly tiresome." Tinch made a sharp gesture at Niloba. A great wind swirled around the Fire Aspect, picked her up, and receded into the distance.  
  
"Niloba!" Nil, Pren, and Linopa all cried out as one, and Pren lifted his daiklaive, even as Nil kicked hers up from the ground and into her hand.  
  
"She's quite alright," Tinch sounded unconcerned with the threats of violence. "The others, excepting Sparrow, will soon be joining her, just on the other side of the hills."  
  
"Maret comes with us," Pren stated. Nil knew from that tone he would not be swayed. But she tried anyway. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Fortune mouth: 'Maret'?  
  
"You said to let the priest decide," Nil pointed out, "and he's not in any position to do so. Furthermore, you never asked me to surrender. You promised to save Fortune if I dropped my sword. I did, you did, and now my side is in control."  
  
Pren smiled, grudgingly. "Then what now, oh victorious one?"  
  
Nil smiled back. It was almost like old times. "Then stay with me."  
  
"No!" Now it was Tinch, Golden Fortune, and Linopa that all spoke in unison.  
  
Nil ignored them. "I'm not going back with you, because you know Niloba will spit me in the night to save your soul. If you want to keep an eye on me, you can stay with me, and I'll prove to you I'm not evil. Or maybe you'll prove that I am. Either way, you'll never get a better chance than this."  
  
The whirlwind returned, and now it was Linopa who vanished, with an abbreviated shriek.  
  
"A Dragon-Blood?" Tinch was almost screeching. "In my Tower?"  
  
Fortune, strangely enough, burst into laughter. "You might as well accept it, old man. Nil has a way of getting what she wants."  
  
"Nil?" Pren rumbled quietly (for him), before speaking in a louder tone. "You laid down your sword. That generally means surrender."  
  
"I never promised that. All putting down my sword meant was putting down my sword. It was a gesture of good faith so you would save Golden Fortune." Nil lifted a finger. "Now, you have to decide if you will accept my terms." She turned to Tinch. "And be my responsibility, Master Tinch."  
  
Tinch sputtered for a moment before regaining his composure. "Your young and stony friend had better be prepared for some unpleasantness mixed in with his truths. He's not going to like it one bit."  
  
"Brother. Pren is my brother," Nil told them. "So treat him with respect. No one ever had better." Gently, she took Pren's arm and led him toward the looming Tower of the Descending Suns.  
  
Tinch and Golden Fortune could do nothing but follow, a tame whirlwind carrying the comatose Sparrow trailing behind. 


End file.
